How do you communicate with staff and families? Have you heard of SMORE? If not, I highly recommend that you check it out!
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| Link to SMORE website |
Last year, in my elementary classroom, I sent weekly newsletters to my family using Adobe Spark. This was a fantastic tool, and our families loved it! This summer, I was introduced to SMORE, and I am completely in love with it!
I plan on sending a "peek at the week" email to my staff every Sunday. My hope with this is to limit the amount of e-mails they receive from me (or HAVE to read from me ;) For my school families, I will be sending their newsletter bi-weekly (twice a month) via Infinite Campus.
So, why do I love it so much? Let me count the ways:
1. The Versatility: You can change backgrounds, fonts, and more! (Super important to this elementary teaching alum! All you primary peeps out there totally get this obsession). You an embed videos, images, galleries, links, and more!
2. The Analytics:
This screenshot was taken about an hour after I sent my parent newsletter. I can see that 223 people had already viewed it (wow...in only 60 minutes!). Not only that, but I can see they viewed it from 38 different locations (cities, states, and even countries! One view was from France!) I can also see how much time they spent (I think the 10+ minute friends must have left the tab open on their computer :). I can even see which links they clicked on the most. During forms and fees this last week, I got SO many compliments from the families I met. They LOVED the newsletter and format. They were especially thankful for the "Intro" video I made about myself for them to get to know me better. Today, this flyer has almost 500 views. That is some serious traffic!
3. The Price: For educators, it is only $79/year! #suchadeal
4. The Ease of Use: Everything is "Click and Add" with great visuals! Their background library is great, plus you can even add your own background image, if you'd prefer! You can even duplicate flyers, which allows you to have a consistent format, just tweaking the parts you need to.
5. The Inspiration: SMORE has an amazing tool called the "Educator's Hive." This lets you see flyers that others have made. You can get inspired and even duplicate their format and tweak them to make your own!
I have been so thrilled with this amazing tool! Check out my most recent staff flyer below:
How do you communicate with staff and families? I'd love to learn with you!
Is this post from Smore or is this blogger?
ReplyDeleteAlso, what do you do to communicate your calendar of events with parents & families. One of the best features I like about Blogger is the ability to incorporate my google calendar agenda of dates. I just have to enter the events on the "Parent Calendar" and the events show up, I don't have to copy, cut or paste!!
Thanks in advance! S'more looks super appealing and I'm hoping to use it with my families this year!
Here's to an amazing year :-)
Thanks for the comment! This blog post was written using Blogger, but the SMORE example that is embedded within the post is from SMORE itself. It can be embedded in a webpage (like I did here) or can be sent as a direct link or even an e-mail. We send a direct link via Infinite Campus (our information management system). We keep an in-house Google Calendar (for staff), and parents have access to a calendar via the district website. Have a wonderful year! ~Angela
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