Email lists, in Edsby or anywhere, aren’t the best way for educators to share general info:

• Email lists are outdated as soon as they’re created – Students and parents come and go, so recipient lists quickly become out of date.
• Recipients can’t benefit from others’ replies – Broadcast emails don’t enable recipients to see what others are saying. Teachers find themselves writing the same answers to the same questions again and again.
• Email is horrible for finding old info – How can any recipient or sender easily find specifics of what was shared in what message?

Edsby was designed to streamline the different communications regularly sent to students and parents in K-12. And rarely does that mean needing to write individual business-style 1:1 emails.

Routine updates to students & parents using Edsby Classes
In a physical classroom, when a teacher wants to tell the class something, they speak to the class or write it on the board. The teacher doesn’t write each student an individual note and hand them out.

Updates and reminders to students related to a specific class can be similarly posted as notes in the feed in each Edsby Class. Anything posted to an Edsby Class is automatically flagged to all students in the class; there’s not even a need to send a message to every student letting them know something has been posted.

Posting routine updates in a single place also enables students who might join a class late to scroll back in the class feed and see old posts and catch up. In a message thread, this isn’t possible.

Posting in class feeds also encourages collaboration and inclusivity. Teachers can enable students to reply to posts and ask questions. Other students may also reply, helping students to learn to work in groups, an important skill.

Teachers may also allow parents into their Edsby classes, giving parents a level of transparency into what happens in class. Parents may read teachers’ notes if the teacher enables it in the Class settings, but cannot see anything any student posts to the class. When parents learn to check students’ classes for latest info, teachers don’t have to message them separately.

Build engagement with parents in Edsby Groups
Many schools and districts use Edsby Groups to promote organized communication with parents. Groups can be created as dedicated spaces for specific topics or projects, such as Parent Volunteer Opportunities, PTA or related conversations. This can keep discussions focused, out of the private message inbox, and always available to everyone in a known place. Important files or announcements can always be found and referenced. Edsby Groups encourage parents to engage in conversations with teachers and other parents, improving participation and community engagement.

Exceptions
Messages still have an important role for private communications between teachers, students and parents. Some things are not appropriate to post to an Edsby Class or Group. But most routine communications to students and parents can be done much more efficiently by posting in Edsby Classes and Groups.

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Your situation is rare; most people are one or the other. But logging into the same Edsby system with different identities at the same time from a single device is totally doable.

Via mobile

Configure the Edsby app on your mobile device with one of your accounts. Then use a tab on the web browser of your mobile device to log in as your other identity, by entering the same Edsby server address as the URL and your other credentials. Then, save the tab to your mobile device’s home screen as a website shortcut, so it appears with its own icon, much like the Edsby app has its own icon. You can even place it right beside the Edsby icon.

It works great. You’ll get essentially the same experience regardless of your access method.

Instructions for saving website shortcuts on both iOS and Android devices can be found here.

Via web browser

You can open multiple browsers on your desktop or laptop and log into the same Edsby system. Open a first browser, e.g. Firefox and log into your system at its unique Edsby server address using your teacher credentials. Open another browser, e.g. Chrome (it cannot simply be another tab on the first browser) and enter the same Edsby server address and your parent credentials. You’ll be able to stay logged in and work simultaneously on both systems.

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Reorder your classes and groups by logging into your Edsby server with a web browser. Click and drag the classes and groups on your desktop into your preferred order. The changes will reflect in the Edsby mobile apps.

Didn’t know you could use Edsby with a web browser? Learn how to log in here.

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Your situation is rare; most families have their kids in the same education system. But logging into different Edsby systems at the same time from a single device is totally doable.

Via mobile

The Edsby app only allows users to configure one Edsby server address at a time. But there’s something of a workaround. Configure the Edsby app on your phone to check one of your children at their unique Edsby server address and the login you were given. Then use a tab on the web browser of your mobile device to check another, by entering their Edsby server address as the URL and the credentials you were given for that system. Then, save the tab to your mobile device’s home screen as a website shortcut, so it appears with its own icon, much like the Edsby app has its own icon. You can even place it right beside the Edsby icon. Repeat for as many children as you have.

It works great–you’ll get essentially the same experience for checking each of your children, though you may find that different organizations, and even individual teachers, may have different policies on what information they choose to share through Edsby.

Instructions for saving website shortcuts on both iOS and Android devices can be found here.

Via web browser

Parents can log into multiple Edsby systems at the same time from separate tabs on their desktop or laptop web browsers. Open a new tab on your browser and log into your first child’s system at its unique Edsby server address, e.g. yyyy.edsby.com, using the credentials you were given. Open another tab in the same browser and log into your second child’s unique Edsby server address, e.g. zzzz.edsby.com with the credentials the second organization gave you. Repeat for as many children as you have. Like your mobile device, above, you can even save desktop links of the browser tabs for each of your children for easy access.

Multiple children in the same district or private school?

This is a separate issue. If you’re a parent seeking to add multiple children in the same Edsby school or district to your single Edsby parent account, the info you want is here.

The post Edsby tip: Students in different Edsby orgs appeared first on Edsby.

Some users might also seek more notifications. Some might want less. Some might want them via their mobile apps. Some might want them via email.

To update, change, add or delete Edsby notifications, access your Edsby Settings. You have the option to opt in or out of notifications for messages, classes, and groups. You can also enable a daily digest of activities, which provides a summary of any new items in Groups or Classes that happened on a specific day, assessments that were due the current and following days, as well as any events happening the next day – all indicated by red bubble counters.

For more tips and shortcuts on navigating notifications, click here.

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But you can always see the exact time and date something was posted or sent if you want to. Exact times are often important! Is your child telling you the truth about when something was submitted, or is due?

On the Edsby mobile app, tap any timestamp. On a browser, hover your mouse over the timestamp, and you’ll be shown the exact time, day, month and year it was posted.

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