Toddle provides an intuitive experience for educators to create announcements. You can send announcements to all or selected staff, students, and family members of one or more classes you are tagged to. As educators, you can also track read receipts, ensuring important updates reach everyone. Learn more in this article!
This article will cover:
Creating announcements
Viewing announcements
Creating announcements
To begin creating an announcement, click on the ‘Announcements’ tab on your homepage.
💡You will be able to create announcements only when the corresponding setting is enabled from the admin’s end.
Alternatively, you can also tap on the bell icon on the top right corner of your screen to access and create new announcements. Click on ‘View all announcements’ to go to the announcement dashboard.
On the landing page, click on the ‘New announcement’ button as highlighted below.
This will take you to the announcement creation page, displayed as a single scrollable interface. Here's how to go about creating an announcement step by step:
1. Add a banner image
If your school administrator has configured default banners for announcements, the relevant banner will be automatically applied based on the curriculum of your class.
You can choose to keep, remove, or replace the banner using the three-dot menu next to the banner.
If you remove the default banner, you will see an ‘Add a banner image’ option. You can then:
Upload a new image from your device
Select an image from Pixabay
Or click ‘Set to school default’ to reapply the school-configured banner
If no default banner has been set, the banner section will appear empty. You can still upload an image from your device or choose one from Pixabay using the ‘Add a banner image’ button.
2. Enter the announcement details
The next step in announcement creation is to add a title (mandatory) and write a description. You can style the description using formatting options, adding emojis, hyperlinks, bullet/numbered lists, etc.
If your school has AI features enabled, you can also generate a description using it. Read this article to learn how to use AI in announcements.
Your content is automatically saved as you type when creating new announcements. This means your work is preserved even if you navigate away. You can find your auto-saved announcements under the ‘Draft’ tab at any time.
3. Add attachments
Use the Attachments section to add supporting files to your announcement. You can:
Upload files from your device
Attach files from Google Drive or OneDrive
Record and attach an audio message
If your school has integrated Google or Microsoft Workspace, you’ll see the option to create a document, spreadsheet, or presentation directly from within the announcement. Once created, the document will be automatically attached to your announcement.
💡The available creation options depend on your school’s configured cloud storage integration.
4. Choose recipients
Under ‘Who should receive this announcement?’ section, you can configure your audience in the following ways:
Option 1: Select recipients from recent announcements
This section displays recipient lists from your previously sent announcements in the current academic year. By hovering over any announcement title, you can see the number of recipients and the date it was sent. You can use the three-dot to scroll through the list to view older announcements if needed.
Click any of these to instantly reuse the same recipient list.
Option 2: Select recipients afresh
Start by selecting the recipient type for your announcement. You can choose staff, students, family members or all user groups.
Next, you have the option to select specific classes to share the announcement with. If you wish to share the announcement with specific members of your school community, you have the option to do so using the ‘Custom’ option. Let’s explore each one of these options in detail:
1. Class level
To share announcements with specific classes, click on the ‘Classes’ option, and then select the 'Add classes' button as highlighted in the screen below.
A pop-up window will appear, displaying a list of all the classes (you are associated to), grouped by grade levels. From this pop-up window, select one or more classes where you want to share the announcement.
Based on your selection, the announcement will be shared with the selected audience for the chosen classes.
2. Custom recipients
If you wish to share announcements with specific members of the school community, use the 'Custom' option. This allows you to create a personalized recipient list for your announcement. To do so, simply click on the 'Custom' option, then select the 'Add recipients' button to add the relevant members.
💡You can only select one group type at a time (e.g., you cannot select both Classes and Custom together).
A pop-up window will appear where you can search for specific members or filter your view using the Group by dropdown. You can choose to view recipients by:
Individuals (default)
Classes
This helps you easily narrow down your recipient list. For instance, if you select ‘Classes,’ you’ll see all classes you are associated with. Upon selecting a class, a list of all associated staff members, students and their family members will appear in the Recipients panel on the right. Here, you can remove any member(s) you do not wish to include in the announcement.
💡Please note that the list of users that appears will depend on the recipient types you selected before clicking ‘Add recipients’. For example, if you only selected Students, the pop-up will only show individual students and students grouped by classes. If you select All members, you’ll be able to choose from students, staff, and family members.
To further customize the recipients list, simply click on the delete icon to remove any members you do not wish to include in the announcement.
5. View recipient summary
After adding recipients, you will see a summary that includes:
The number of recipients in each user group: Staff members, Students, and Family members
The total number of recipients
Delivery options for each user group – via Toddle, email, or both
Use the checkboxes under ‘Send an email’ to control whether each user group should also receive the announcement via email in addition to Toddle.
6. Preview the announcement
Before publishing, you can preview how your announcement will appear to recipients. Use the ‘Toddle Preview’ dropdown at the top-right of the screen to switch between different preview modes:
Toddle preview: See how the announcement will appear inside the Toddle platform on various devices. Toggle between web, tablet, and mobile views using the tabs at the top.
Email preview: View how the announcement will look when delivered via email. Toggle between web, tablet, and mobile views using the tabs at the top.
7. Publish or schedule the announcement
Once you’re ready, you have two options:
Click ‘Publish’ to send the announcement immediately
Click ‘Schedule’ to send it at a later date
For scheduling an announcement, enter the date manually or use the date/time picker in the scheduling modal. Your announcement will be automatically published on the exact date and time you have selected.
After publishing, recipients will:
Receive a notification under the bell icon
See a badge on the homepage ‘Announcements’ card indicating new announcements
Viewing announcements
To view announcements, use the left pane on the 'Announcements' page. Let’s explore each section in the left pane:
Inbox - Lists all the announcements that you have received.
Drafts - Lists all the auto-saved announcements.
Scheduled - Lists all the announcements scheduled by you for a later date.
Sent - Lists all the announcements that you have sent/published.
Bin- Lists all the announcements that you have deleted.
Click on any announcement in the list to view its details. This will include its title, description and attachments, if any. Furthermore, you will be able to view the name of the publisher and the date and time when the announcement was published.
For visibility on the recipients of the announcements created by you, use the 'Read on Toddle' option.
This will present a comprehensive list indicating who has accessed and read the announcement, as well as those who are yet to do so.
Likewise, you can review the classes with whom the announcement has been shared by utilizing the 'Sent to' option, as shown in the above screen. This will provide you with a curriculum-based list of classes that have received the announcement.
You have the ability to edit or delete your own announcements. Simply choose an announcement from ‘Draft’, ‘Scheduled’ or ‘Sent’ list and click on the pencil icon to edit any necessary information. While publishing an updated announcement, you can choose to update with or without notifying the recipients. Alternatively, if you wish to delete an announcement, use the trash icon.
💡It's important to note that when editing an already published announcement, auto-save is not enabled. Changes to live announcements must be explicitly saved. This prevents accidental updates from going live.
When you delete an announcement, instead of being permanently removed, it is moved to the ‘Bin’ tab in the left pane and is no longer visible to the recipients.
💡Note that when you delete a draft announcement, it will be permanently removed and will not be stored in ‘Bin’.
To restore and republish a deleted announcement, select the announcement you wish to recover and click the ‘Republish’ button.
This will open up the announcement in edit mode, where you can make the required changes, adjust the recipients and choose whether to republish immediately or schedule it for later.
Once republished, the announcement will appear as a new post in recipients' inboxes, and they will receive a notification. The republished announcement will start appearing in your ‘Sent’ tab.
Additionally, you can quickly find specific announcements by entering keywords in the search bar at the top right. You can also filter the announcements to narrow down your search within the ‘Inbox’ tab using the filter icon.
Clicking on the filter icon will open a modal with the following filtering options:
Created by: This lists all staff members who have published an announcement. You can choose one or more names from here.
Class(es): This tab will show a list of classes you are tagged to. You can select one or more classes to view announcements specific to those classes.
Published Date: You can filter and view announcements based on the date they were published.
Recipient type: This tab allows you to filter announcements based on the recipient groups they were targeted to.
Status: The ‘Status’ tab allows you to filter announcements by read/unread status, helping you focus on unread or previously missed announcements.
Once filters are selected, click ‘Apply’ to view the filtered announcements. To reset a specific filter, you can click the ‘Reset’ option next to that filter. To clear all applied filters and return to the full list of announcements, you can use the ‘Reset all’ option at the bottom of the filter panel.
Using these filters, you can easily focus on the most relevant announcements and stay informed and up to date.
We hope that you could find what you were looking for. Explore other articles for more!