MusicFirst: Work in Progress

I am a few weeks in on musicFirst.  I am more convinced that this is a pretty good idea--that isn't quite working in practice.

• I assign a lesson from Musition.  Two parts.  First part is "Introduction to Terms" which is basically just a list of vocabulary words.  Second part is the assessment.  In the student view the "Introduction" does not show up on their task list.  You have to go into their class calendar to find it.  So they just see the quiz.  In teacher view I am thinking I gave some work, then an assessment.  Students just see assessment.
• Also, if you place "Introduction" on September 8, it disappears for the student on September 9.  They can't use the resource to study for end of unit test.
• How the "Units" work in Musition and Auralia is really unclear (see above).  Do I just assign a Unit and everything takes care of itself?  Do I need to go into each lesson and assessment and mark due dates?
• If a student actually takes the assessment it is not graded correctly.  If a student gets an 11/11 they get 11% in the gradebook.
• Musition assignments can't be put into categories in the gradebook.  THATS annoying.
• I really wish they placed "Announcements" on the landing page.  
• There is no "Check" for students that they read/opened an announcement or reading assignment.
• I still need to learn how to really get Sight Reading Factory rolling.  It seems like Level 1 stuff is a bit too hard for absolute beginners.
• I don't get the sample lessons on my splash page.  How do I assign them?
• I can't figure out at all how to get student work into my portfolio.  It seems like all the work I assign has no option for that.

I am getting better at it and hope after a few more weeks I am an expert and the software makes more sense.  All the above stuff is fixable--or I am just doing it wrong (perhaps more likely). 

A few other notes:

• Messages is working well for me.  If we could merge Messages and Discussion that would be great.  One place!!
• They say the true/false or MC tests are graded automatically now.  Not in my experience.  Not sure where/how I am supposed to make this happen.
• The Support lady who reads my emails has been really good.

In short--this is a pretty good portal to software.  If it is going to be an "Online Classroom" (that charges good $) we have some work to do.