NextLesson, a K-12 developer of personally relevant curriculum, launched InterestID, a student interest and lesson discovery tool, at EdmodoCon 2015.

InterestID will be responsible for helping teachers identify students' interests and easily find standards-aligned lessons on topics students want to learn.

"Love the individual interest survey," commented one teacher according to the most recent Press Release. "This will be GREAT at the beginning of the school year or when a student is new to school to see what their interests are."

InterestID categories include sports, books, movies, food, music and gadgets. Rating the categories is made easier by filters and students have the power to add new categories if they can't find one that's listed. For teachers and students a summary of the most liked categories exists as well.

Teachers are able to view the interests of their students in a summary that displays the top categories, most popular interests within those categories, and recommended lessons from NextLesson based on those interests. Teachers can view summaries for individual students or classes as a whole, and track changes in their students' interests over time.

"We want to help teachers make learning relevant by connecting lessons to things students already know and like," says Dion Lim, Founder and CEO of NextLesson. "By having students voice their interests through InterestID, teachers can meet students where they are by discovering lessons that their students will find interesting and engaging."

Teachers were very vocal in their praise of the app as one educator commented, "The best part of the tool is being able to see the interests my students have and to see possible activities that I could use," according to the release. "My students really enjoyed looking at all of the choices, especially in the food category."

The idea behind the project seems to be helping connect educators with their students in ways they believe can be beneficial to a positive, hip and enjoyable learning experience.

InterestID is a free tool available on nextlesson.org and in the Edmodo Store. Those who want to learn more on the tool, NextLesson included the InterestID Overview video.

Full release.

Press Release posted by Navindra Persaud, Education World Contributor.