What does the new planning feature do? Well, quite a few things it turns out!
Storypark’s new planning feature was designed and developed on the advice of our partners and users who told us they need a better way to collaborate around their programme and curriculum planning.
After listening to educators around the world, we realised that everyone plans differently and that there could be no one-size-fits-all solution, so we developed a tool that enables educators to create and manage their own planning templates, and plan the way they want.
Check out how Daisies Early Education and Care Centre have used the planning feature to create planning templates that are customised to their service.
Each plan can link together your stories, plans and child planning notes and provides a great way to get an overview of what’s happening at your centre as well as what’s happening for an individual child. Plans enable you to see pieces of documentation in the context of previous or group learning, to better understand and manage your planning cycles, and to keep all your centre tasks, admin, documents and planning in one easy-to-access place.
A plan is private to its author, but that person may choose to share it with other educators and individual or all parents. If shared with educators they will be able to collaborate on the plan together. If shared with parents, parents will be able to view and leave comments.
With new planning you are able to:
- Create and manage your own planning templates, so you and your team can plan the way you want, with who you want.
- Involve all teachers in your planning by inviting them to contribute.
- Build understanding by inviting parents to view and comment on any plans you choose to share.
- Provide an overview of what’s happening at your service.
- Link stories, plans and child notes together, making it easier to visualise the learning journey for each child.
- Keep all your service’s tasks, admin, documents, policies and planning in one easy-to-access place.
Because of its flexible nature, it doesn’t just have to be used for programme planning!
The sky’s the limit but some potential uses are:
- Your annual plan
- Programme/curriculum planning (individual, group, service-wide, projects)
- Your QIP
- Self-review
- Meeting agendas, minutes and action points
- Project planning
- Event planning
- Daily diaries
- Health and safety plans
- Consulting on, and storing important documents and policies
- Summative assessments you can share with a child’s parents
- Transition reports you can share with a child’s parents and future centre
- ‘About me’, or ‘About our children’ sheets that include birthday, pictures, current interests, friendships, aspirations, allergy info, emergency contacts, special needs etc
- Teacher appraisals
- A private reflective journal
- A personal development plan
- A calendar
- Mentoring teachers in training
- Questionnaires
Check out some of the ways Storypark users are using planning in their centres
Planning with consistency and coherency at Daisies Early Education and Care Centre – read more
Plan for everything from QIPs to appraisals with Storypark’s planning tools – read more
Families collaborate on planning for children’s learning at Norman Park Kindergarten – read more
Planning with Storypark helps teachers succeed at Te Puna Reo o Ngā Kākano – read more
What this will mean for your current planning?
You’ll have a new Planning tab on your services’ profile page that replaces your current teacher planning notes.
Already have some teacher planning notes? Don’t worry, we’ll put them into a special new Archived area.
Want to learn more?
We’re offering free fortnightly online workshops to anyone who is interested in learning more. (We’ll be recording the workshops so if you can’t make it you can watch a video.) Register here.
Do you have questions about the new planning tool? Check out the help centre here, leave us a comment, or get in touch with our friendly customer service team by emailing hello@storypark.com
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