A class in an institution is a circle, with two things a tutor’s circle does not have: a moderator role, and join requests. This article is how to organise them, who can do what inside one, and the decision worth making before you create thirty.
What an institution circle has
- Roster — Everyone in the class with their progress at a glance.
- Assignments — Homework pointing at real content, with completion measured from the learner’s own checkpoints.
- Timeline — A shared feed of class activity.
- Leaderboard — A class ranking. Optional in practice — use your judgement about the group.
- Messaging — Between members of the circle, and nobody outside it.
- The Learning Lab — Each learner’s seven-facet profile, subject to their own plan.
- Join requests — On a public circle, learners ask and you approve rather than walking in.
- Moderators — A role between owner and member.
Owner, moderator, member
The owner is the teacher whose class it is. A moderator helps run it — a senior teacher, a teaching assistant, a second teacher on the same cohort. A member is a student.
Moderator is the role most institutions under-use. The instinct when someone needs more than member is to make them an institution admin, which hands them billing and bulk import. Moderator gives them the class and nothing else.
How to organise them
Mirror how you actually teach rather than how the timetable is written. The useful test: who needs to see this group together? If nobody looks at a grouping as a unit, it should not be a circle.
- By teaching group — The default and usually right — the set of students one teacher sees each week.
- By level, if you set by ability — Assignments land better when everyone in a circle is at a similar band.
- Not one per student — A circle of one gives you nothing a learner profile does not, and the group figures never appear.
- Not one giant circle — A whole year group in one circle means every assignment goes to everyone and the roster is unreadable.
Private or public
Private is the default and right for a managed cohort — invisible unless you are in it, and you add people.
Public means listed, with a request join policy: learners ask and a teacher approves. It is the shape for an open enrichment class or a holiday programme, not for a timetabled one.
Circles are unlimited
No tier caps the number of classes. Teacher seats and student capacity are the limits — see seats, tiers and limits — so splitting a cohort into six circles costs nothing.
Common questions
Unlimited, at every tier. Only teacher seats and student numbers are capped.