Events - Streamlining Tonic Tutor Data

Feb 17th, 2012

Posted by William

You may have noticed the new Events link that recently popped up in your sidebar - if not I recommend you click on it and take a look at what you've been missing out on. The Events stream is our most recent effort to try and streamline how teachers access all of the data that quickly accumulates on Tonic Tutor from week to week. Our goal with the site has always been to offer the best of both worlds - something that's simple on the surface but provides fine grained detail as you drill down into the data.

Finding the balance between these two ideals can be difficult. As we continue to add features, we always run the risk of making things overly complex. We don't want to hide all of the options completely, but at the same time we don't want a hundred different links and menus to choose from. It's especially difficult to see the site from the perspective of newer users since we've spent so much time staring at everything. With events, we're hoping to aggregate all of the important things that are happening in one place and reduce that complexity a little bit. We're not really saving teachers time if they have to spend an hour clicking through dozens of pages and links just to find out how their students are doing.

The main inspiration for events comes from my recent infatuation with Twitter. I was initially skeptical of Twitter - it seemed like a platform that people used to follow the boring minutiae of their favorite celebrities' lives. But as I started to use it more, I realized how useful having a stream of information I could tailor to my tastes could be. I get all of the articles that interest me linked in one convenient place, which means I no longer have to go to each individual newspaper or website. As I thought about how to make Tonic Tutor more efficient and streamlined, it made sense to take that idea of a stream of important information and apply it to the site.

Has anyone found that the Events stream saves them time? Does anyone have any idea for other events they'd like to see tracked? I'm also really curious if anyone in our community uses Twitter - either in their studio or in general.