How to build a course and put it in the planner

A course is your curriculum as an ordered list of lessons, like "Saxon Math 5/4, lessons 1 to 120". Put it in the planner and it fills in one lesson per school day. Next year, schedule it again for a younger student.

Start from the free library

Tap Browse the library on Courses. Each course follows a free OpenStax textbook: math from Prealgebra through Precalculus and Statistics; Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Astronomy; U.S. and World History; and American Government, Economics and Psychology. There's one lesson per section, with the section's learning goals and a link to read it. Tap See the lessons to look first, then Add to my courses. You get your own copy: rename lessons, add or remove some, and schedule it for a student like any course.

Make a course

1. In the planner, tap Courses at the bottom, or go to Courses.
2. Under Make a course, type its name. Add a subject and the book or publisher if you like.
3. Tap Make the course. Its page opens, ready for lessons.

Add lessons

Under Add lessons, pick how:

• Type or paste: one lesson per line. Copying from a spreadsheet (Excel, Google Sheets, Numbers)? Select the cells and paste. The columns are title, notes, minutes, in that order, or put a header row (Title, Notes, Minutes) on top and they can be in any order.
• Numbered: for books that go "Lesson 1, Lesson 2…". Type what each is called and the first and last numbers, like Lesson 1 to 120.
• From a file: a spreadsheet saved as CSV, a text file with one lesson per line, or a course file.

Then tap Add lessons. New lessons go on the end. A course can have up to 500.

Change lessons

Tap a lesson to change its title, notes or minutes. Use ↑ and ↓ to move it, and × to remove it. Notes are a good place for page numbers, materials and links.

Put it in the planner

1. On the course, under Put it in the planner, choose who: one student, Each student separately, or Whole family together.
2. Pick the planner subject, the start date and the days of the week you'll do it.
3. Already partway through the book? Set Start at lesson.
4. Tap Put it in the planner. One lesson goes on each of those days, in order, until the course is done.

Lesson times come from the lesson, then the course's Usual lesson length, then the subject's usual length. Checking lessons off counts toward your records as usual.

Fell behind? Push it back

Sick day or field trip? On the course, under In the planner, tap Push back a day. Every unfinished lesson from today on moves to its next school day. Finished lessons stay where they are.

To stop a course, tap Take out of the planner. Unfinished lessons from today on are removed; finished ones stay in your records.

Share with your group

On the course, under Share with a group, pick the group and tap Share. Families in that group see it on their Courses page under Shared in your groups and can tap Add to my courses to get their own copy to change and schedule. Your course stays as it is. Which students use a course is never shared. Tap Stop sharing to take it back; copies families already made stay theirs.

Save or move a course

Under Details, tap Download course file to save the course as a file. Someone else can bring it in from Have a course file? on their Courses page.

Only parents can change courses. Teens in the household can see them.