Adding Courses to your Planner

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Planbook allows you to add courses to your file after the initial setup process. Planbook allows you to:

  • Add an existing course to days the class didn't previously meet.
  • Add a new course to a day (or days) in your schedule.
  • Add a course to a subset of the days in your file.
  • Add a course to a fixed day of the week (even if your file is a rotating or block schedule).
  • Add an existing course to a single day of your year.

Contents

Adding an Existing Course to New Days in your Schedule

Adding an existing course to a weekly repeating or same thing every day schedule
Regardless of the type of schedule you use, Planbook allows you to easily add an existing course to days that the course didn't previously meet. To add an existing course to new day, first use the Schedule-->Add Course menu item to bring up the Add Course window. Then, select the Add Meetings to an Existing Course tab.

Once you have the window up as shown to the right, you can select the course you want to add from the pop up on the left. Then, use the checkboxes to assign the existing course to the days in your schedule. The example to the right shows either a Weekly Repeating or Same Thing Everyday schedule. If you have a rotating or block schedule, the table will show the days of your rotation rather than the days of the week (by default).

Adding an Existing Course When That Course Meets Already

Planbook does support multiple instances of a single class on a single type of day. To add an additional meeting for a class, follow the same steps listed above for Adding an Existing Course to New Days in your Schedule but select the day that the course already meets. Doing this will result in an additional meeting of that class.

There are some issues to consider before doing this.

  1. Publishing will not work properly with multiple meetings of a single class on a single type of day.
  2. Syncing to PlanbookConnect will not work properly with multiple meetings of a single class on a single type of day.
  3. If a day contains multiple instances of a class, those instances cannot be individually removed. All the instances of that course will be removed when removing courses.

If those caveats aren't acceptable, you'll want to create a new course with a different name (Physics AM and Physics PM, for example) and add the new course rather than repeating an existing course.

Adding a New Course to Your Schedule

Adding a new course to your plans
If you get assigned a new class to teach or find that you want to plan an additional activity, after-school program, or other block of time, you can easily add a completely new class to your plans.

To add a new class to your schedule, first choose the Schedule-->Add Course menu item. You'll be presented with the add course window. Make sure you've got the create a new course tab selected as shown to the right.

Name the new class (note that this name must be unique in your file) and choose the days that you would like it to be added. The example to the right shows a weekly repeating schedule. Rotating and Block schedules will reflect the days of your rotation, rather than the days of the week.


Adding a Course to a Subset of the Days in your Schedule

Planbook 3 adds the ability to add a course to a range of dates in your calendar, rather than the entire calendar from beginning to end. This option is available for both adding completely new courses or adding an existing course to new days in your schedule. The Add Course window has a new section at the bottom (shown below) enables this feature.

Adding a Course to a Range of Dates

Select the button next to from to add a course to a range of dates. The dates set, by default, to the full range of the calendar. You can change this to any set of dates.

Important Things to Remember When Adding Courses to a Range of Dates

Planbook treats classes added to a subset of days differently than other classes. Here's how these courses are treated differently.

  1. You will not be able to change the time of a course added to a subset of days from the Schedule-->Assign Course Times menu item. You must change times using the settings sidebar.
  2. You will not be able to remove the course added to a subset of days using the Schedule-->Remove Course menu item. You must remove the course using the settings sidebar. You will only be able to remove the course one day at a time.

Adding a Course to a Fixed Day of the Week When Using a Rotating Schedule

Occasionally, teachers want to add a course, activity or meeting to a fixed day of the week despite their normal schedule being a block or rotating schedule. Planbook 3.0 now supports this feature. If you use a rotating or block schedule and open the Schedule-->Add Course menu item, a new checkbox will appear. The screenshots below show the effect of toggling the checkbox for an A/B block schedule.

Adding a course to an A/B block schedule
Adding a course to a fixed day despite having a rotating schedule

Important Things to Remember When Adding a Course to a Fixed Day of the Week

Adding courses to a day of the week turns all of those days into custom days. This means that:

  1. When adding courses to days of your rotation, custom days are excluded. If you added a course to every Tuesday, all of your Tuesday days will be excluded when adding courses to days in your rotation..
  2. You cannot change the times for all lessons on those custom days using the Schedule-->Assign Course Times menu item. You can change times for each lesson manually using the detail mode.
  3. When removing courses from days in your rotation, those courses will not be removed on those newly created custom days.
  4. There might be instances with creating non-school days where the schedule shifts. The course you added to a particular day of the week will shift as well.

Use of this feature is only recommended if you understand and can live with the consequences listed above.

Adding a Course to a Single Day of the Year

Addcoursedaytools.png

Adding a course to a single day of the year is the only course addition that's not made from the Schedule-->Assign Course Times menu item. Rather, to add a course to a single day:

  1. Click on the small gear icon found in a lesson on the day you'd like to add a course
  2. Click the Add A Course button from the Day Tools section.
  3. Choose the course you'd like to add from the dialog that appears and click Add Course. The course will then be added.
Addcoursedaydialog.png

The day to which you added a course will also be converted into a custom day.

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