Teacher Resource Center

Why Zipper?

The school year is a busy time for teachers, parents and students. Keeping everyone up to date can get pretty overwhelming. It’s hard for teachers to know what, when and how to communicate, and parents are busy people who don’t always find it easy to keep up with the flow of information. Everyone is doing their best!

Zipper reads the emails written by you, the teachers and staff at a school, and it tries to make sure that parents are paying attention to WHAT they need to know WHEN they need to know it. Think of Zipper like the smartest, fastest and most helpful classroom helper you could ask for (outside of the classroom!).

How Zipper works

To illustrate how Zipper would work, let’s use a field trip as an example. You might find yourself communicating about a big outing several times, yet there are still permission slips to get signed and everyone needs to remember to pack a lunch for the day out. Just to add to the mix, the evening before the forecast changes and now it’s calling for rain. 🌧🌧🌧

In this case, Zipper will do a few things:

Read your first email about the field trip and create a reminder for the parents. If the field trip is not happening within a week, Zipper will wait.
Once the field trip is approaching, the parents will get a reminder, most likely on the Sunday night before around 8pm, but this will depend on what works best for the parents.
If there are any reminders that the parents need, such as to pack a lunch or bathing suit, or if something happens like a change in the forecast, the parents will get a reminder at some time during the day before the field trip.
Finally, a message will be sent to the parents on the morning of the field trip as a final reminder, if Zipper feels it is necessary.

If you send any emails about changes to the event, Zipper will update the parents. There are ways to make that easier for Zipper, but generally you shouldn’t have to worry about it.

Sharing Zipper with parents

Well informed parents are happy parents. The reality is that every parent and household is different,but if your class parents are using Zipper then you don't need to worry about that, and they get the information they need in a way that works for their unique needs.

You can sign up here to generate a unique Zipper link to share with your class parents. They’ll get access to a free version of Zipper, and when parents upgrade you can get rewarded! For every sign up you earn $5 towards an Amazon.com gift card to buy supplies for your classroom, or to do whatever you want with it. It’s our way of saying thank you for spreading the word.

When you share your special link with you class parents, Zipper is able to help them much more quickly because it will come with the knowledge that you are their child’s teacher. It’s a big help for everyone when you share!

Writing Zipper friendly emails

Communicating with parents can take up an incredible amount of time and can be a frustrating experience. Some parents want more emails and more details, while other parents will rarely even open those messages you’ve spent so much time writing.

Zipper is a tool built for parents, but Zipper can be your secret helper. We want the same thing that you do as a teacher: regular, clear and easy communication. The result is students who are better prepared, happier and parent’s who can be more readily involved in their child’s schooling.

When your classroom parents are using Zipper you can expect that they will know important information and be ready to act on it at the appropriate time. This means more kids coming to school prepared and ready to learn.

Zipper reads the emails you send and breaks it down into 1 of 4 categories. If an email has more than one subject (such as a weekly newsletter that covers a broad set of topics) then Zipper will read through each one. It does get a bit more difficult for Zipper when the number of topics increases, but it can handle almost anything.

The 4 categories are:

1- Events

2- Requests

3- Reminders

4- Information

Anything you write about that does not fall into the Events, Requests or Reminders categories will generally end up being treated as Information.

Here are the top 10 tips for writing Zipper friendly emails!

Write a single email per topic
Reply to your own message to provide updates
Be explicit about what type of email it is

If you write words like “Event”, “Request” or “Reminder” early in the email, Zipper will understand it
You can even put the keyword in the Subject line of the email

Indicate which class or Grade you are writing about

Zipper will translate that for each parent

Avoid attachments

Zipper will read and process them, but it adds a layer of complexity

You can include a special information section to share important information about an event. This is done in a way that makes it useful for parents whether they are using Zipper or not.

Here are 4 examples of great Zipper ready emails.

Events

To specify an event, include a block like this in your email. It can be at the top, bottom, or anywhere else.

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Event

Name: End of year fair!

Date: Wednesday June 24th, 2004

Start: 3pm

End: 4pm

Information: There will be hot dogs and pizza for sale!

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Requests

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Request

Name: End of year fair!

Information: We need parents to help run the games during the fair. Please email Ms Ray if you are able to help.

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Reminders

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Name: End of year fair, bring your own hot dogs

Reminder: Please bring hot dogs or pizza slices with you to the End of Year Fair, you can then sell it to another parent.

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Information

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Information

Information: There will be a health inspector on site during the End of Year Fair.

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