Texting Parents Using Remind

A couple years ago we took our students on a field trip to the farm. It was about an hour away, our bus was full so we asked parent volunteers to meet us there. On the way, not only did the bus driver get lost but the off-ramp was closed and she had to take a detour. We knew we were going to be really late and didn't want all those parents waiting at the farm to be worried. So we proceeded to call all the parents up one by one on our cell phones. This was time-consuming and now all those parents had our personal cell phone numbers, which we usually do not give out.

This last year we discovered Remind!
When you sign up (free), you are able to text/chat with your entire class using your cell phone. All you have to do is download the instructions and hand them to the parents in your class. We added the instructions to our Back to School Night packets at the beginning of the school year. The instructions give parents a code they text to join and receive texts from the teacher.

Here is what the parent instructions look like:

We have used this as a means to send a friendly reminder of upcoming events and activities. It can be used on field trips, and be used during emergencies. You can text a person or the entire class at once.

Here is what the Remind site looks like when accessed on the computer:

What a great resource for teachers!

We hope you check it out!