Getting started: your first week of teaching

This guide walks you through the tools you reach for most in your first week. Work through it in order, and stop and come back whenever you need to. Each step is a few minutes.

Everything here lives inside a classroom you are assigned to. Open the Classrooms tab on your school dashboard and click into your room to find these tools.

1. Add a lesson for today

Open your classroom and click Plan Lessons. Pick competencies from your curriculum areas, then assign each one to the children who will receive it during the morning or afternoon work cycle.

This is not strictly what a Montessori guide does. You observe the child first, then follow their interest, and much of the day is unplanned by design. But when there are things you want to plan ahead and present, this is where that planning happens.

2. Record an observation about a child

Capture an observation and link it to a competency and a child. This is the running record of what each child is doing and learning.

You do not need a screen on the mat. Print observation sheets ahead of time, carry them on a clipboard, and mark them by hand during the work cycle. At the end of the day, scan the sheets back in and reconcile them, and the records get entered without you typing each one.

3. See the whole class on the progress grid

Open the Progress Grid to see every child against every competency in one view. Each cell shows where that child stands, from not yet presented through mastered.

Click a cell to update a child's mastery level. Scan the grid to spot who needs a new presentation and where the class as a whole is ready to move forward.

4. Set up office hours and meet with parents

Open the Office Hours tab in your classroom and add the time slots you are available. Parents see those slots from their own dashboard and book a meeting directly.

You see your upcoming bookings on the same tab. Office hours work well for conferences and check-ins, and the parent is notified when you confirm or cancel.

5. File an incident report

Record an incident when something happens that needs to be on file: a scraped knee, a tumble, a conflict between children. Open the child's profile, go to the School Records tab, and add an incident report.

Write what happened and any follow-up. Incident reports are for staff only, so parents do not see them.

6. Write the day's summary

Open your classroom and click Daily Summary to write a short narrative of the day: what was presented, who showed notable progress, anything to follow up on tomorrow.

This summary is automatically included in the daily digest that is emailed to parents at the end of each day. Write it before that delivery time so it makes the email.

7. Upload photos

Open the Photos tab in your classroom and add photos from the day: children working with materials, a setup, a special event. Tag each photo with the children pictured and the competencies they were working on.

Tagged photos tie into progress tracking, and parents can view and download them from their own dashboard.

8. Post notices to families

Open the Posts tab and write a notice for your classroom. Set the visibility to your room, and the families in that room see it on their dashboard.

Use a notice for one-way updates: a field trip reminder, a request for supplies, a weekly recap. Set an expiration so old notices clear themselves.

9. Message parents directly

Open Messages for back-and-forth conversation with families. You get one-to-one direct messages and group channels, with attachments and reactions.

Use messages for the day-to-day questions and quick updates, and notices for the announcements that belong on the dashboard.

That is the core of your week. From here it settles into a rhythm: plan and present, observe as you go, write the summary, and keep families in the loop. The rest of this help center covers each area in depth.