Distance and hybrid learning have introduced a new set of challenges for teachers, parents, and students, especially when it comes to the technology that makes these learning modes possible. We understand that it can be challenging when you are trying to teach a lesson and the tools are not working correctly, so we put together this list of tips to help solve some of the most common troubleshooting problems students and parents face when trying to access lessons on Mystery Science.
My student can’t open the student link.
Your students will be unable to access the lesson through the student link if they are logged into a Mystery Science account. This may be because their parent/guardian has an account, or because the student has tried to create their own account. Remember, we don’t allow student-owned or student-created accounts on Mystery Science. Please ask your student to completely log out of the Mystery Science website and clear the cache on their computer. Once that is done, they should be able to open up the student links without any problems.
The video isn’t loading/playing on my student’s computer/device.
First, have your student try completely closing down their browser and restarting it. There are known issues with almost every web browser that can go away simply by restarting.
If the problem persists, ask the student to clear their browser’s cache. If they have another browser on their computer (such as Chrome or Firefox), have them try opening the student link in one of the other browsers, and see if they have the same problems with it. Sometimes problems are browser-specific.
Mystery Science is blocked on my student’s device or my school’s network.
Your students might have trouble playing our lessons if a website we use to host our content is blocked at your school or district. Visit our video test page to see if any of our video providers are being blocked. If a website is blocked, you will need to talk to your school’s IT department about unblocking it in order to continue playing our videos.
We also realize that a lot of schools and districts have firewalls in place that restrict sites such as YouTube, so we also host our videos on Wistia. For more information on how to switch to our Wistia player, including how to make sure student links open in Wistia, check out this help article: How can I switch to your other video player?
For more information on the best ways to share Mystery Science with students, check out these articles:
How do I share lessons with students or my child at home?
How do I use lessons for distance learning?
If you need additional help troubleshooting parent/student access, please feel free to contact our support team here.