At the end of 2021, we shared that the Sensei team was expanding and that we had great plans for 2022.
Now, a year and eleven major releases later, we hope you feel that we have delivered on that promise.
And we are just getting started.
Our mission is to help you create and sell the most engaging courses possible and as easily as possible. In case you missed it, let’s look back at some of the highlights from last year of how Sensei is aiming to help you meet this goal.
Be sure to read to the end for a sneak preview of our roadmap for 2023.
Learning Mode
The biggest update to Sensei LMS ever, Learning Mode, is our distraction-free experience for lessons and quizzes.
Initially launched in March with a free template in Sensei LMS, we then added three new templates to Sensei Pro in October. Two of which are designed specifically for video courses.
Based on our stats, we estimate that around 20% of Sensei users have enabled Learning Mode. Because we believe it is the best learning experience for your students, we’d love to see this number increase in 2023.
Check out more about Learning Mode here.
Videos
In addition to the video Learning Mode templates, improvements for videos in courses include:
Video Progression (added in January) – lets you require videos to be watched before moving on to the next lesson.
Interactive Videos (released in August) – pause videos and add any content, including quiz questions, helpful text, buttons, and more.
VideoPress, our sister service, released a new standalone plugin in October so that it is easier for you to take advantage of the best video hosting service for WordPress.
Learn more in our Guide To Better Video Courses here.
Quizzes
Quizzes can provide valuable feedback to both the learner and the instructor. Over the last year, we’ve put a lot of effort into giving you more tools to assess learning and provide realtime engagement.
Starting with new quiz pagination in January, you can break up longer quizzes into more manageable chunks for learners.
In February, we released new answer feedback blocks, which let you show different content based on if a quiz question was answered correctly or not.
A quiz timer and sorting order question type rolled out in March.
And in May, we made it possible to add single quiz questions anywhere — in a lesson, on pages, on blog posts, and more.
Review all of Sensei’s powerful quiz tools here.
Interactive Blocks
Creating engaging and unique content can significantly increase educational value for your students. But creating truly interactive content can be a challenge.
To help on the front, in May, we released new blocks for flashcards, image hotspots, and task lists. These can also be used outside of lessons on any WordPress page or post.
Shortly after that, we added a required block setting for all interactive blocks and videos, that if enabled, students can’t move on to the next lesson without engaging with the content first.
Then, in August, came new block visibility and block scheduling options. You can easily show and hide content based on course enrollment, student groups, and more. Plus, you can schedule content in a lesson to show in a given time frame.
Discover more about our Interactive Blocks here.
Course Management
When managing courses, you have a lot on your plate. Sensei’s tools can help you save time so you can put more energy into more important things.
We started with a massive overhaul of our reporting system in March. See the latest student activity, export reports, and keep better track of everything going on.
In July, we rolled out new tools for managing Groups & Cohorts in Sensei Pro. From what we’ve heard, it has been a time saver for many of you, and we look forward to extending these features in the months to come.
A new Course List block lets you place a customizable course catalog anywhere, which is also useful for logged-in students to keep track of enrolled courses and progress.
December’s Co-Teachers feature was highly-requested and lets you better collaborate on courses with more than one instructor.
A Free Course Theme
We may have saved the best for last. In December, we released a new free WordPress block theme for creators. We call it Course, and it integrates perfectly with Sensei LMS and everything mentioned above.
We made this theme so that you can launch sites faster, easier, and knowing that our team is here to provide help with anything that may come up.
Learn more about the free Course theme here.
2023 Roadmap
The work continues. The landscape of online education is evolving, and Sensei will lead the way.
Roadmaps are always a work in progress, but here are a few items we can confidently say are coming to Sensei LMS and Sensei Pro over the next year:
- Improved certificates
- Guest students and logged-out courses
- Customize all emails that Sensei sends
- More choose your own adventure options for lessons
- Gamification elements
- In-course collaboration
- There is more, but we can’t share quite yet
The above doesn’t even begin to go into the countless small improvements, bug fixes, and performance enhancements of the year, and we’ll continue that progress going forward too.
How has Sensei helped you accomplish your goals in 2022, and what would you like to see next?
Let us know in the comments below.
Happy New Year!
Leave a Reply