Playground

Learn how Playground can help your center run efficiently and streamline processes.

What is Playground?

Complete key end-of-year tasks, including generating tax statements, billing reports, and reviewing outstanding balances.

Your Guide to Closing Out the Year

Learn to adjust your Playground app settings.

Mobile App Settings Overview for Admins

Learn where to find Playground’s latest feature updates directly inside the platform.

How to View Product Updates in Playground

A free, members-only perk that helps you save on everyday supplies for your center.

Playground Saving Club

Adrian Ruiz

Nadiuska

Josh Andrews

Help topics that apply to administrators and the Administrator Dashboard

For Administrators

A step-by-step guide to setting up and using Playground.

Playground Onboarding Guide

Learn how to export rosters and other data from other systems like Procare, brightwheel, and more

Migrate Data & Roster Exports From Other Systems

Template emails and messages drafted for admins to send to families and staff during the Playground rollout

Introduce Families & Staff to Playground

Learn how to take your Playground knowledge to the next level with Guided Walkthroughs.

In Product Guided Walkthroughs

Videos to assist Spanish-speaking providers onboard onto Playground

Onboarding Videos for Spanish Providers

This article explains how the automated Nightly Reset updates student and staff statuses, clears system data, and ensures a fresh start each day.

Automated Nightly Reset

Learn which tablets are compatible with our app on iOS, Android, and Fire devices to ensure the best experience.

Device Compatibility for Playground App

Configure Your School Settings

Aileen Gray

Implementing Playground

Learn about billing processes for administrators

Billing Overview

Resolve common billing issues regarding mismatched balances!

Resolving Common Issues with Tuition Billing Balances, Credits, and Charges

Here’s a guide to understanding issues that are caused by duplicate charges and how to resolve them effectively.

Handling Duplicate Charges

How Autopay works, what to expect on your first run, and how to avoid common issues.

Before Running Your First Autopay

What to review, how to confirm it processed correctly, and answers to common post-Autopay questions.

After Running Your First Autopay

Learn why a payout adjustment happens, what causes it, and how to identify the transaction behind it.

Negative Payouts

What to expect as you prepare to receive your first deposit from families.

Before Getting Your First Payout

What to review, what’s normal, and what to do if something doesn’t look right once your first deposit hits your bank account.

After Your First Payout

Zach Fortin

Billing

Set up Playground billing in just 4 easy steps

Billing Implementation Overview

Learn how to setup and manage the bank account where payout deposits will be disbursed

Manage Payout Deposit Account

Learn how to customize your Playground Payment Settings.

Configure Billing Settings

Understand why Playground asks for the last four digits of my social security number

Why do you need personal information to verify my program's billing account?

Exploring the Stripe sign up process for Billing

Signing up for Stripe

Learn how to use filters, totals, and sorting in the Transactions table to quickly answer common billing questions.

Navigating the Transactions Table

Daniel Andrews

Sasha Reiss

Billing Implementation

Billing Plans Overview

Learn what a debit is and how to create one for a student. This article covers all the ways to post a debit in Playground, from the Billing Overview, Statements…

Create a Debit

Learn how to create student billing plans of all types

Create Billing Plans

Billing statements reflect all billing-related activities that occurred on a student’s account in the specified billing period

Understand & Generate Tax Billing Statements as Admins

How to bill by the day, hour, or minute of time spent in care

Attendance-Based Billing

Learn about the different fee approval types and how to charge families for late pickups, incidental charges, & program enrollments

Fee Approvals

Best practices for creating late fees to charge guardians for overdue payments

Late Charges for Overdue Payments

Managing drop-in care availability and bookings

Drop-in Care Billing

Learn how to edit and update existing payment plans.

Adjust Debits

Learn about billing alerts and reminders on payments homepage

Review Billing Alerts and Billing Reminders

Learn how to manage and delete student billing plans of all types

Manage Billing Plans

Billing Plans & Charges

Track collections & see exactly how much was paid, when it was paid, and what was paid for.

Family Payments Overview

Manage autopay, guardian payment methods, and guardian charges.

Manage Guardian Payments, Autopay, & Overdue Balances

Correct and adjust student balances by creating, editing, or deleting charges and credits

Correct Account Balances

Payouts refer to deposits made to your bank account for money you have collected through Playground.

Payouts

Logging & applying offline payments payments made by guardians, like cash, check, or third-party payment tools like Venmo, Zelle, or Cashapp

Offline Payments

Handle disputed charges, failed payments, and other unexpected scenarios like negative deposits.

Disputed Charges & Failed Payments

Family Payments & Deposits

Record subsidy payments from state, federal, and local third-party agencies.

Track Subsidies

Subsidy Tracking

Learn how to track your payment and report on data logged

Billing Reports

How to upload billing data directly into Quickbooks from Playground

Reporting for Quickbooks

Create custom reports with customized data for student health

Generate or customize student health-related reports in Playground

Update student records to correct reporting issues for attendance.

Resolve discrepancies and errors in attendance reports

Reporting & Accounting

Learn how to log check-in/out and edit attendance records

Log & Manage Student Attendance

Manage & Submit Subsidy Attendance Data

Guardians can let you know their estimated time of arrival for check-in and check-out

On My Way Queue For Staff

Enable carpools for your families that live close together and view the active carpools for your center!

Manage Carpools as an Admin

Learn how to enable, complete, and utilize daily wellness checks

Wellness Checks

Set up keyless entry using Playground's integration with Kisi

Integrate Kisi with Playground

Complete a Name to face check-in for your classroom to make sure all students are present.

Name to Face

Set up door access using Playground’s partnership with MellinTech.

Integrate MellinTech with Playground

Attendance

A complete guide to Playground's Paperwork features

Paperwork Overview

Create and edit forms for guardians to complete and manage submissions.

Create & Manage Forms

Create, edit, and send fillable PDFs and manage guardian submissions

Create & Manage Fillable PDFs

Request documents to be uploaded by guardians and view guardian submissions

Create & Manage File Requests

Upload view-only files and share them with guardians

Create & Manage Resources

Paperwork only accessible to providers for their records

Provider Paperwork

Learn how staff paperwork works in Playground, including how to view assigned documents, track completion status, and manage paperwork across staff members.

Create and Manage Staff Paperwork Overview

Learn how to create, customize, and manage staff forms in Playground. This article walks through setting up forms for staff paperwork, collecting signatures, and managing completed submissions.

Create and Manage Staff Forms

Learn how to upload, customize, and manage fillable PDFs for staff paperwork in Playground. This article walks through adding fillable fields, assigning PDFs to staff, and managing completed submissions.

Create and Manage Staff Fillable PDFs

Learn how to create and manage file requests for staff in Playground. This article walks through requesting documents from staff, tracking uploads, and reviewing submitted files.

Create and Manage Staff File Request

Learn how to upload and share view-only resources for staff in Playground. This article walks through adding staff resources, controlling access, and updating who can view shared files.

Create and Manage Staff Resources

Molly Farber

Paperwork

Learn about enrollment and how it can help your center streamline registration!

Enrollment Overview

Learn how to create and edit enrollment listings to share with families.

Create an Enrollment Listing

Learn how to manage applications once they've been submitted.

Manage the Enrollment Funnel and Accept Students

Learn how to use the email editor in the enrollment funnel to customize automatic emails sent to families.

Email Editor

Enrollment

Learn how admins can set chat permissions, create group chats, archive/delete chats, mark chats as read, and download chat transcripts

Chat for Administrators

Learn how to utilize parent engagement on both the web

Manage the Feed on the Web

Create a post that is sent out to all users in your Playground account.

Record & Post Activities to the Feed on Mobile

Create and send newsletters to your families and/or staff.

Newsletters

Add, edit, and manage events on your school's calendar!

Manage the Calendar

Learn how to use AI to automatically adjust text, correct spelling and grammar, and tailor your tone.

Meet Camber: Your Childcare AI Assistant

Learn how admins can use the Chat, Feed and Newsletters to request materials from Guardians.

Request Materials from Guardians

Amanda Galluzzo

Communication

Program Management

Learn how to navigate the student profile.

Student Profile Overview

Learn all the ways you can add your students to Playground.

Add Students to Playground

Learn how to edit student information, customize student profiles, inactivate students, and schedule future changes in Playground.

Edit & Manage Students

Student Schedules

Track your student immunizations and vaccine records on the Student profile.

Student Immunizations

Student Management

Create, edit, and assign students to classrooms

Create & Manage Classrooms

Ensure you have staff coverage for all students in a class

Manage Classroom Ratios

How to add, edit, and delete programs, program enrollment, & program attendance

Create & Manage Programs

Forecast Enrollment shows classroom capacity, utilization, and schedule changes. The enhanced tools make it easy to track transitions, view future schedules, and understand how each classroom will look for the…

Forecast Enrollment: Enhanced Tools

This classic view shows daily capacity, utilization, and FTE totals based on your center’s schedule settings. You can review open and filled seats and switch between schedule based and classroom…

Forecast Enrollment: Classic FTE Tools

Transition students between classrooms throughout the school day

For Administrators

Implementing Playground

Billing

Attendance

Paperwork

Enrollment

Communication

Program Management

Payroll & Employee Time Tracking

CRM & Marketing Automation

Learning, Lessons, and Assessment

Food Program

Expenses

Reports

Settings