It’s no secret parent communication is a crucial piece of the ECE puzzle — because if your teachers become isolated or parents feel out of the loop, brand commitment will plummet on both sides.
By bolstering employee and parent communication so that the right information can easily flow both ways, you can effectively buck these trends and build an engaged community that’s invested in making your center work.
But what are the key steps to improving parent and staff communication? And with so many moving pieces, how can you be sure to get it right?
In this step-by-step guide, we’ll show how to use essential LineLeader communication features to bring teachers and parents closer together.
Psst! Rather watch than read? Check out the below video and get the full walkthrough in less than 4 min.!
5 simple steps to stellar parent communication
- Keep your teachers, teams, and parents up-to-date
- Make drop-off easier
- Track vital information (and share it with parents)
- Share key dates with parents, teachers, and staff
- Make everyday communication simple
Step 1: Keep your teachers, teams, and parents up-to-date
To make sure employees and parents stay on the same page, you need to keep them up-to-date with all the latest info, from policy changes to the latest school events.
Here’s how to get the right information to your teams and families when they need it:
- Prepare your annual news cycle: News doesn’t always come out-of-the-blue. At the beginning of the year, create a news calendar with the important events you know are coming, so when it happens, you’re ready.
- Decide how to communicate updates: Gone are the days of heavy paper handouts. Today, most parents and teachers expect digital updates. To avoid losing info on the way, invest in one digital tool that does it all, so employees and families know exactly where to find the information they need.
- Make it simple with Announcements: MomentPath’s Announcements are the very first thing parents and teachers see when they log in. The customizable pop-ups can be used for anything from announcing pajama day to sharing updated policies and procedures — or even sending a daily appreciation message to teachers.
Step 2: Make drop-off easier
In an ideal world, teachers would be able to connect and chat during drop-off, but the truth is, we all know how busy this time can be. Even before the new safety
That’s why we’ve come up with a better way: Informed Arrival.
Informed arrival is perfect for bridging the gap between busy parents and hectic drop-offs. By sharing crucial messages via LineLeader, you can show parents and teachers you truly understand what’s important.
Here’s how it works:
- Parents can share key information with their child's teacher before they even get to the school via the app. They can mark their child absent, give info on their last meal, and even share their child's morning mood.
- Teachers can then see everything they need to know about each child in one place and keep checking back for reminders if needed.
Step 3: Track vital information (and share it with parents)
Every moment tells a story. And while some parts of that story are more exciting than others, MomentPath allows you to see the whole picture.
From nap time and sleep checks to tracking health issues or incidents, MomentPath’s Moments help teachers keep track of vital information, and help parents stay connected to their child's day with a detailed daily report that they can access in a single tap.
Here are just some of the Moments to choose from:
- Comment Moment: Share a quick note with parents or post a photo into a child’s timeline.
- Food Moment: Log when a child ate lunch or snacks or had a bottle feed, and how much was consumed (you can also connect your menus to Food Moments).
- Health Check Moment: Perform a health check when a child arrives at the center, screen for symptoms of colds, flu, or COVID-19, and keep track of symptom timings.
- Learning Moment: Record when a child takes part in activities correlating to the lesson plan, share photos and track how they engaged with other children.
- Supplies Moment: Notify parents when their child needs to bring extra supplies to class, or make parents aware their child is low on certain supplies.
Note: There are many more Moments to choose from, including Portfolio, Ouch, Incident, Illness, Behavior, Potty, Sleep, Medical, Safety, and Mood Moments.
Moments are a great way to boost employee and parent communication — but they also allow center directors to see what’s working well (or not so well) across every center, with a report function on every Moment.
And that’s not all.
To help give parents total control over their daily notices, they can pick and choose which Moments appear as push notifications.
And when the worst happens and admins need to contact parents immediately?
The administrator-only Notification Moment overrides parent preferences to push emergency alerts straight onto parents’ cell phone home screens, so no parent ever misses an important message again.
Step 4: Share key dates with parents, teachers, and staff
Notifications and Announcements are great for instant teacher and parent communication — but what if they just need an overview of what’s to come?
That’s where the Calendar comes in.
The calendar ties three important elements together for families, making this a one-stop shop for everything they need to know each day.
- Announcements: If Announcements are dismissed from the home screen, parents can always go back and find them in their calendar.
- Curriculum: The calendar displays the upcoming curriculum with full descriptions, and even allows teachers to share documents with families.
- Lunch menu: We know lunch menus get lost in families’ emails and they often forget what cycle you’re on — so this makes it super easy for parents to sign into the app and see what's cooking.
Step 5: Make everyday communication simple
When teachers have a classroom of children to care for, the communication role often gets left behind.
But not anymore.
With LineLeader's Message Center employee and parent communication has never been simpler.
Here’s how it works:
- Employees can communicate easily: With the Message Center, employees working different shifts can leave messages for each other without ever worrying their post-it notes will get lost under a pile of paperwork.
- Parents can send last-minute messages: Every parent has been there: You get home and realize your child’s sippy cup is still sitting on the kitchen counter. With the Message Center, parents can now send that message directly to the teacher, so they know provisions will be made.
We know what you're thinking: ‘This will never work.’
But trust us, this is one of our users’ favorite features. At LineLeader by ChildcareCRM, we know how valuable your time is, and by improving employee and parent communication, you won't regret how much time you end up saving.
Teachers and administrators can send single or group messages to parents.
Light Bridge tells us how LineLeader has helped change the game.
"[LineLeader by ChildcareCRM] really shined and demonstrated their flexibility throughout the whole selection process," said Ben.
Lightbridge Academy chose LineLeader because of its ability to replace existing tools, integrate with their payroll system, offer data protection, and make their business scalable and more efficient.
Take employee and parent communication to the next level
The strength of your ECE community relies on how well you bring everyone together.
From drop-off to behavior tracking, your communications need to show both your parent and staff community you care about keeping them involved — that taking an active role matters.
Because there’s more to great parent-teacher communication than boosting enrollment. At the end of the day, great comms is all about bringing your community together — and with LineLeader, that’s never been easier.
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