Overview
Audience: Teachers
Platform: Web only
🛠️ Events can only be created from the TalkingPoints web app.
👀 Looking for info on syncing or managing your calendar? Check here!
What You Can Do with the Calendar Feature 🧭
You can use TalkingPoints Calendar to:
Create sign-up events for 1:1 meetings or conferences.
Create class or group events for shared activities.
You can invite:
All families in a class or group.
Individual students’ families.
About Sign-Up Events 🗓️
Each family automatically receives a unique TalkingPoints link to sign up for a time that works best for them.
Use sign-up events for:
Parent-teacher conferences
1:1 family check-ins
Important things to know:
Each guardian gets their own unique sign-up link.
Each family can only see their own scheduled time slots.
Guardians of the same student receive different links.
Teachers cannot view which slots are still open or which families haven’t signed up.
Once a family signs up, that slot is locked and can’t be edited.
Sign-up links close 12 hours before the first time slot begins.
All-day events on your synced calendar (like “State Testing”) make that full day unavailable.
📌 Note: If an event’s first word is “Free” in your calendar, it will appear as available time in TalkingPoints.
💡 Tip: If your sign-up covers multiple days, double-check your synced calendar for all-day events that could remove availability. For example, if you have a “New Year’s Day” all-day event on January 1, that day will not appear as available in TalkingPoints.
How to Create a Sign-Up Event 🧱
Go to Calendar in the left-side menu.
Click Add Event.
Choose one of these options:
Invite all families in a class or group: Set up a class-wide event with sign-ups.
Invite individual students’ families: Set up a check-in event with one or a few families.
Fill in your event details:
Event name: up to 80 characters
Location (optional): not translated
Description: up to 600 characters; you can add documents or personalized notes
Duration: 15, 30, or 60 minutes
Select your available times.
Your synced calendar is private — families never see it.
Click Create Event to send invitations immediately.
📤 Sign-up events send right away — they can’t be scheduled to send later.
✅ Families will immediately receive their invitations to sign up.
What Families See 👀
Families receive:
A message with their personal sign-up link and event details
Event details (title, description, optional location/doc)
In the Family App: the event appears on their calendar once they sign up.
In SMS: they receive the same info plus their unique sign-up link.
❗ Only one guardian per student can reserve a time slot.
Managing Sign-Up Events 🔒
You can:
Delete individual claimed slots if needed.
You can’t:
Edit the event after a family signs up.
See pending or unclaimed slots.
View all available times in one overview (there’s no “admin” event view)
Add a Family After an Event Has Started Filling 🧩
If a family still needs to sign up, you can create a new event just for them:
Click Add Event.
Choose Invite individual students’ families.
Select the correct student(s).
Add and confirm all event details.
📝 This new event can use the same scheduling options as your original sign-up event. TalkingPoints uses the same availability logic — families will only see open times based on your synced calendar.
Block Off a Time Manually 🚫
If you need to make a time unavailable for sign-ups, add that event directly to your synced calendar (like Google Calendar).
TalkingPoints will automatically recognize it and remove that time from your available slots — no extra steps needed.
About Class/Group Events 🧾
Create shared events for your full class or group — no sign-ups needed.
Use this for:
Back-to-school night
Class performances
Field trips
To create:
Choose Add a class-wide event.
Select your class or group.
Add the event details: name, description, location, and time.
(Optional) Make it recurring.
Click Create Event.
🔁 Only the first invitation is sent — no reminders for recurring events.
Event Reminders ⏰
Families automatically get a reminder 24 hours before the event. You can configure reminder timing to send hours or minutes before the event (default is 24 hours).
Reminder message template:
“This is an automated reminder for your event ‘[Title]’ with [Your Name] on [Date] at [Time], at location ‘[Location]’. Please reply to [Your Name] if you have any questions.”
Reminders are only sent if:
The event starts more than 12 hours after it’s created.
The event is at least 24 hours away when the reminder is scheduled.
The event is not recurring.
✅ Reminder messages are automatically translated for families.