Parent Guide

This guide covers everything parents need to know about using PlanStudyBoost to support their children's learning.

Overview

As a parent, you can:

• Accept an invite link from your child to connect your accounts
• View a full read-only profile of their schedule, grades, and analytics (via Students in the sidebar)
• Enter grades on their behalf (if your link includes this permission)
• Grant awards for achievements
• Sync your Google Calendar with family activities

Getting Started

1. Create your account — the easiest way is by opening the invite link your child sends you (see below), which takes you straight to sign-up
2. Accept your child's invitation
3. Enter grades or grant awards

Linking to Your Child

Your child starts the process, not you. They generate an invite link from their own account and send it to you directly (text, email, however they'd normally reach you).

Accepting Your Child's Invitation

1. Open the invite link your child sent you
2. If you don't already have an account, select Create an account; if you do, select Log in
3. Once you're signed in, you'll see who invited you and what they're requesting
4. Select Accept invite

What Happens Next

Your child still needs to confirm the connection on their end before it becomes active — unless they've turned on auto-confirm, you'll see it listed as pending until they do. You'll get access to their data as soon as they confirm.

Permissions

Every parent invitation currently requests both of the following together — there's no way for your child to grant just one:

Entering Grades

If you have the Enter Grades permission on a link, you can record grades on your child's behalf from the dedicated Grades page.

Opening your child's Grades page

Select Grades in the sidebar. The page opens showing the grades for whichever child is currently in context. If you have more than one linked child, use the student switcher chips at the top of the page to choose whose grades to view.

The sidebar Grades link carries the current student context from your dashboard automatically. If you visit /grades without a student selected, you are redirected to your dashboard to choose a child first.

Adding a grade

1. On the Grades page, select + Add Grade
2. Fill in:
   • Student's subject — chosen from your child's active subjects (not your own)
   • Assessment name — e.g., "Math Test Chapter 5" (max 80 characters)
   • Score — points your child received
   • Out of — the maximum possible score (must be greater than 0)
   • Date — when the grade was received (today or in the past)
   • Term — optional; e.g., "Term 1" or "Semester 2"
3. Select Save Grade

The grade appears immediately in the correct subject group without reloading the page.

+ Add Grade is only shown when your link for that child has the Enter Grades permission and your child has confirmed the link. If the button is missing, your link may still be waiting for your child's confirmation. Link permissions can't currently be changed after linking.

Grade entry rules

• Grades are calculated as a percentage automatically
• You can only delete grades you entered — grades entered by administrators or other parents show no delete icon
• Grades cannot be edited; delete and re-enter if you need to correct a mistake

Self-grading and the Enter Grades permission

If your child's account has no parent linked with Enter Grades permission, they can record their own grades (self-grading). As soon as you link with this permission, self-grading is automatically disabled for that child — the + Add Grade button disappears from their Grades page and only you can record new grades.

Tip: If your link is removed, self-grading is re-enabled for your child automatically, unless another parent with this permission is still linked. You don't need to change any setting on their account. Only an administrator can remove a link. See Removing a Connection.

Granting Awards

Recognise your child's efforts by granting awards. You can do this from two places: your Dashboard (for quick suggestions) or the dedicated Awards page (for full control and custom awards).

Granting from the Dashboard

When your child reaches a streak milestone, the Award Suggestions card on your dashboard shows a Grant → button. Selecting it opens a small panel where you can confirm or customise the title, add an optional reward message, and then grant the award.

See Granting awards from the dashboard above.

Granting from the Awards page

Select Awards in the sidebar to open your child's full Awards page. Use the student switcher chips at the top to choose which child you are viewing.

Like the Grades page, the Awards sidebar link carries the current student context from your dashboard. Visiting /awards without a student selected redirects you to the dashboard.

The Awards page shows three sections:

Granting a pending streak award

When the Ready to grant panel appears:

1. Select Grant → next to the suggestion you want to grant
2. A confirmation appears inline: "Grant '[title]' to [name]?"
3. Select ✓ Confirm — the award is granted immediately and the row disappears
4. The new award card appears in your child's award wall

Select ✕ at the confirmation step to cancel without granting.

Granting a custom award

To recognise an achievement that isn't a streak milestone:

1. Select 🏆 Grant custom award (top right of the award wall section)
2. Fill in:
   • Award title — required; what the award is called (max 200 characters)
   • Description — optional; explain what your child did to earn it (max 1,000 characters)
   • Subject — optional; link the award to a specific subject
   • Awarded on — optional; defaults to today
3. Select 🏆 Grant Award

The new card appears at the top of your child's award wall immediately.

Deleting an award you granted

Each award you personally granted shows a delete icon (🗑) in the top corner of its card (visible on hover on desktop; always visible on mobile). Awards granted by other people — such as administrators — show no delete icon.

To delete an award:

1. Hover over the award card (desktop) or find the 🗑 icon (mobile)
2. Select the delete icon
3. A confirmation overlay appears on the card: "Remove '[title]'? This cannot be undone."
4. Select Delete to confirm, or Cancel to keep the award

Awards are permanent once granted — there is no automatic undo. If you grant an award by mistake, delete it and re-grant with the correct details.

Family Calendar

The Family Calendar is your dedicated calendar page, found in the sidebar under Family Calendar. It shows:

• Your own family activities (created manually or imported from Google Calendar)
• Your selected child's study schedule (read-only)

Use it to spot scheduling conflicts before they happen, add family activities, and manage your Google Calendar connection.

For a full walkthrough, see the Family Calendar guide.

Adding a family activity

1. Go to Family Calendar in the sidebar.
2. Select + Add family activity in the toolbar, or click any empty time slot.
3. Fill in the title, start time, and end time.
4. Select Create Activity.

Connecting Google Calendar

1. Go to Family Calendar in the sidebar.
2. Select ○ Link Google Calendar in the toolbar.
3. Sign in to Google and grant read-only access.
4. Your events will begin importing automatically.

Once connected, the toolbar button changes to ✓ Google Calendar ▾. You can disconnect from the same button, or manage sync settings in Settings > Calendar.

Imported vs. manual events

Study schedule conflicts

PlanStudyBoost warns your child when a family activity overlaps with a planned study block. This helps them reschedule study time before the event, rather than discovering the clash at the last moment.

For full details, see the Family Calendar guide and the Google Calendar & Family Activities guide.

Viewing Progress

Your dashboard

When you sign in, your dashboard shows an overview of one linked child at a time. At the top of the page, a row of buttons — one per child — lets you switch whose data you are viewing.

Student switcher

Each button shows your child's name. The currently selected child has a green border and a ✓ indicator. Select any button to switch to that child — the page updates instantly without reloading.

The URL updates to include ?student=… when you switch, so you can bookmark a specific child's dashboard view in your browser.

Dashboard widgets

Once a child is selected, four information cards appear:

If a child has schedule conflicts (study items that clash with family activities), a red alert strip appears above the cards showing the number of conflicts and a link to their schedule.

Granting awards from the dashboard

When an award suggestion appears, select Grant → to open the Grant Award panel:

1. The award title is pre-filled — you can edit it if you prefer different wording.
2. Optionally add a Reward or Message (up to 200 characters), such as "Extra 30 min of screen time tonight!"
3. Select Grant Award to confirm.

You can also select + Grant a custom award at any time to create a freeform award without a suggestion.

Student profile page

The student profile page gives you a deeper read-only view of one child's study data across four tabs. To open it, select Students in the sidebar — you land on the profile of your first linked child. If you are linked to more than one child, use the student chips at the top of the page to switch between them.

The chip row on the student profile page works like the one on your dashboard: the selected child's chip has a green border. Clicking a different chip navigates to that child's profile while keeping the same tab open.

Overview tab

The Overview tab shows a snapshot of your child's recent study activity:

If your child has schedule conflicts (study items that clash with another event), a red alert strip appears above the cards. Select View schedule → within the strip to jump directly to the Schedule tab.

Schedule tab

The Schedule tab shows all upcoming study items in chronological order, grouped by date, for the next 14 days:

• Study blocks — planned study sessions with a subject and time slot
• Practice sessions — music, sport, or other practice sessions
• Tests and exams — upcoming assessments with location details

Items with a schedule conflict are highlighted with a red left border and a pulsing Conflict badge.

A collapsed Recent (last 7 days) section below the upcoming list shows events that have already passed. Select it to expand.

All items are read-only — you cannot create, edit, or delete study items from this page.

Grades tab

The Grades tab shows all of your child's recorded grades, grouped by subject. Each grade card displays:

• Assessment name and date
• Score (e.g., 85 / 100)
• Colour-coded percentage badge — green (Excellent ≥ 90 %, Good ≥ 75 %), amber (Satisfactory ≥ 60 %, Needs Improvement ≥ 50 %), red (Failing < 50 %)

No Add Grade button appears here. To enter grades, use the dedicated Grades page instead — see Entering Grades.

Analytics tab

The Analytics tab shows the same 12-week progress charts your child sees on their own Analytics page:

• 12-week progress chart — study minutes per week, broken down by subject, with a 4-week moving average line
• Impact indicator — how study time correlates with grade performance
• At-risk subjects — subjects where the all-time grade average is below 75 %
• Study patterns — when during the day and week your child studies most

Use the 4w / 8w / 12w selector in the top-right corner to change the time window. This controls how many weeks of data the charts display — it does not change any stored data.

If your child has not yet recorded any timer sessions, an empty state message is shown instead of the charts.

Study Block Settings (Auto-Expiry Override)

Study blocks left Pending or In Progress past their end time are automatically marked Not Done after a grace period (1–3 days, default 3). By default, each student manages their own grace period from their account settings — but as a parent, you can optionally override it for a linked child.

Your child can mark a study block as completed until 3 days after it ends, also when it has already turned Not Done. After that, the block can no longer be marked completed, so the weekly picture you see stays reliable. The grace period can't be longer than those 3 days. See Study Blocks for what your child sees.

Setting an override

1. On your Dashboard, select the child you want to manage using the student switcher.
2. Find the Study Block Settings card.
3. Toggle on Set a custom grace period for [child's name].
4. Use the + / - buttons to choose the number of days (1–3).
5. Select Save override.

While your override is active, your child's own grace-period setting is locked and their account settings page shows Managed by a parent.

Note: The grace period used to go up to 7 days. Overrides of 4 to 7 days have been lowered to 3 days. You don't need to do anything.

Removing an override

1. Toggle off the override in the Study Block Settings card.
2. A confirmation appears, since your child will regain control of their own setting.
3. Select Remove to confirm, or Keep override to cancel.

Multiple Children

You can link to multiple children. Each link is separate, and permissions are set individually per child.

When you have more than one accepted link, the student switcher at the top of your dashboard shows a button for each child. Select a button to switch views. For accounts with more than five linked children, the switcher becomes a dropdown menu instead.

A pending connection (one your child hasn't confirmed yet) does not appear in the switcher until your child confirms it.

The student profile page (sidebar: Students) also has a chip row at the top when you are linked to more than one child. Selecting a chip on the profile page navigates to that child's profile, keeping the active tab (Overview, Schedule, Grades, or Analytics) open.

Tips for Parents

1. Set expectations together - Help your child set realistic weekly goals
2. Celebrate achievements - Use awards to recognize effort
3. Review, don't micromanage - Check progress weekly, not hourly
4. Respect privacy - Only access what you need
5. Encourage consistency - Streaks build good habits