Playground Staff schedules can be used to schedule your staff and ensure that you have appropriate coverage for all your classrooms. Staff can view their schedules to plan their week. You, as an Admin, can also view any time off requests, and approve or deny them, via the same Schedules tab.
Viewing staff schedules
Navigate to the Scheduling tab on your Admin Dashboard and then select Schedules.
Click the Staff tab at the top of your screen to view all staff schedules.
Use the options at the top of the table to adjust the week you want to view. You can also choose to sort the table by name or classroom.
Click Filters to show the schedule for a specific classroom.
Click the white Print button to print your weekly schedule.
The number of scheduled and absent staff members will also be shown next to each day towards the top of the schedules table.
The number in the orange box indicates how many staff members are absent for the day and the number in the grey box shows how many staff members are scheduled for the day.
Add a one-time schedule
One-time schedules can be added for multiple staff and multiple days at a time. Alternatively, you can schedule one day at a time from the staff schedule table.
Add one-time schedules for multiple staff/days
From the Staff Schedule screen, click the blue Manage Schedules button in the top right corner of your screen, then click Add One-time Schedule.
A scheduling window will appear. Here, you can select the staff to whom the schedule applies, assign staff to a classroom, and select the days and times.
Once you are done making selections, click the blue Save button.
Add one-time schedules
From the Staff Schedule screen, click the day you would like to add a schedule.
Click This week only.
Adjust the start and end times as needed and choose a classroom.
Then click the blue Save button.
If you need to make edits to the one-time schedule, click here.
💡 You can add two schedules for a staff on a single day by repeating the add schedule process twice for the same day. This can be helpful for scheduling breaks and lunches.
Add a recurring schedule
From the Staff Schedule screen, click the blue Manage Schedules button in the top right corner of your screen. Then click Add Recurring Schedule.
Select the staff the recurring schedule should apply to and assign the staff to a classroom.
If the schedule has an end date, toggle on End date. If you do not select an end date, the schedule will repeat weekly indefinitely.
Specify the times and days of the schedule.
Click the blue Save button when you are done.
If you need to make edits to a recurring schedule, click here.
💡 Recurring schedules will be marked with a double arrow icon 🔄 on the scheduling table.
🚨 Adding a recurring schedule will override existing schedules for the staff selected.
Create a template schedule
Create a template schedule to add schedules for staff quickly. You can see an overview of all templates from the Template tab on the Scheduling screen. When adding schedules, you can select a template schedule from the Add Schedule Window.
💡 Template schedules can be used for both staff and student schedules.
From the Staff Schedule screen, click the blue Manage Schedules button in the top right corner of your screen. Then click Create New Template.
The template window will open. Name your template and select the days/times of the schedule.
If the template is to include multiple start and end times, click the blue + Add another time
If the template is to have a start and end date by default, toggle on Include default start & end date and select the date range.
Click the blue Save template button.
Schedule staff absences
Staff can be marked absent with various absence types, including vacation, sick, bereavement, holiday, personal, and other.
💡 Any staff absence can be marked as a paid absence. If you are using Playground Payroll, paid absences will automatically flow to payroll. Click here to learn more about Playground Payroll.
From the Staff Schedule screen, click on the day/staff you would like to add an absence for and then click Record time off.
The Record Absence Window will pop up. Select if it's partial day, full day, or multiple days. Confirm the date and add and time off type.
If the absence should be paid, click the Paid Time Off checkbox and then enter the number of hours that the employee should be paid for.
Click the blue Record absence button to save.
The absence will now appear with an orange line on the scheduling table.
Delete a Schedule
To delete a schedule, click on the schedule box and then select delete this time slot if it's a one-time schedule, or delete recurring schedule if it's a recurring schedule.
Edit a one-time schedule
To edit a one-time schedule, click on the schedule box and then select Edit this timeslot.
The Edit scheduled time menu will open, then select staff and classroom.
Select a Start time and End time.
If desired, click the blue + Add another time to add additional Start times and End times.
Select the days of the week that the times will apply to.
Click the blue Save button.
Edit a recurring schedule
To edit a recurring schedule, click on the schedule box and then select Edit recurring schedule.
The Edit a recurring schedule menu will open, then select staff and classroom.
If the schedule has an end date, toggle on End date.
Specify the times and days of the recurring schedule.
If desired, click the blue + Add another time to add additional Start times and End times.
Click the blue Save button.
🚨If you do not select an end date, the schedule will repeat weekly indefinitely.
Staff schedule settings
Adjust your schedule settings to customize the schedule table. Click the white Settings button in the top right corner of the screen. Choose from the options below as desired:
Settings | Definition |
Hide weekends on calendar | Select this to only show Monday - Friday on your screen |
Show classroom colors for scheduled times | If you have colors assigned to your classrooms, select this option to change the color of the schedule box based on the classroom assigned |
View student schedules as a table | Select this to reformat student schedules into a table. |
Hide classroom names | Select this to remove the classroom name from the schedule box |
Resource View
The Resource View is utilized to see the overlap of student and staff schedules per classroom, over the entirety of the day. It easily pinpoints times throughout a specific day where there may not be enough staff scheduled or too many staff scheduled.
💡 Green time slots are staff schedules. Blue time slots are student schedules.
From the Admin Dashboard, navigate to the Scheduling > Schedules tab
Click on the Resource view tab at the top
Use the buttons at the top right of the table to navigate to a specific date
View the total scheduled time per classroom on the table
Click the [+] plus symbol to the left of any classroom name to open that classroom's specific schedules
Click the [-] minus symbol to the left of any classroom name to close that classroom's specific schedules
Time off requests
Your staff can request time off, for example either Sick or Vacation time, via their mobile applications. Admins will be able to see all historical and upcoming, pending requests in one location to easily keep track of staff time off.
Approving and denying staff PTO requests
From the Admin Dashboard, navigate to the Scheduling > Schedules tab
Click on the Time off requests tab at the top of the page
Click on any Pending approval requests
On the modal that populates, you can select if the absence Paid time off or not
You can either select Approve or Deny at the bottom of the request
Approved requests add an absence to that staff member's schedule for the times that listed in their request.
📱 If you’re on the Mobile App, follow this link to view our Staff Hours for Teachers article to see how staff request time off in the mobile app.
Viewing approved and denied PTO requests
Declining a PTO request will send an email to both parties, and the Time off requests tab within Scheduling > Schedules will have a filter for you to view specific statuses(approved, denied), start dates for the PTO, or requests from specific staff members.
Filter options | What is filtered |
Status
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Start date |
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Staff |
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