A valuable app for any educator, Talking Points for Teachers allows you to message families in English and rest assured that your message will be understood since it will be delivered in their home language. Currently supporting over 20 languages, Talking Points for Teachers uses a combination of human and machine translation to ensure accuracy and cultural sensitivity. Talking Points for Parents is the companion app that allows parents to send messages to educators through their mobile phone. Messages can be sent in the home language and will be translated for delivery to the educator. These apps, in combination, allow for a stronger parent-educator partnership and greater school-home connection.

Website: https://talkingpts.org/

Talking Points for Parents

What Users Love About the App

“I love and appreciate this app!!!!! I wish more teachers would use it! It’s much easier for me than the email system!!!! I get information about what is going on with my child right away!”

“I can at least try right then to remedy the issue or problems my child is having, when I’m notified about them! Especially now, through this pandemic and distance learning situation! Thank you to all the teachers and staff who utilize it!”

“Last minute changes and reschedules have never been smoother. It’s great the kids love that we can contact their teachers outside the educational platform they’re using online. As remote students, I think it makes it easier for them.”

“Very convenient and simple! Our first time sending off our preschooler and I was a little shaky about the instant communication just to check on my child. I also felt relieved to receive picture mail of my child learning, exploring and having fun.”

“I love it because you can easily communicate and ask your teacher a question better than using Gmail. Idk about other students, but this app helps me way more and I feel a lot more confident getting my work done.”

What Users Dislike About the App

“The app doesn’t always send messages!! it is extremely glitchy, causing major issues in my communication with teachers. Talking Points has actually made me LESS connected, not more. So, so disappointed.”

“I don’t like somethings about this app. If the mother of my son is talking with a teacher about him the app doesn’t allow me to follow the conversation.”

“Never notifies when I have a new message. Wish they just called like they used to, or send notes home. Smh.”

“The app works fine, but it serves the wrong role. It’s frustrating to have messages from my kids’ teachers mixed in with my other text messages, especially when they’re general announcements. Email, or a LMS would be great for this; texting is the wrong tool for this.”

“Messages don’t open. I can see when I have a message, and part of the content, but when I click on it to open it loads and loads and never opens.”

Talking Points for Teachers

What Users Love About the App

“It was so simple once I got a response from customer service. I enjoy using both the online version and the app to stay in contact with my students. It is a great tool, and very easy to use!”

“I have used Talking Points this past school year to communicate with parents of English learners and it’s been the most parent-teacher communication I’ve had.”

“Overall, it has been very very handy! I definitely recommend it to any teachers, but especially those in ESOL.”

“This app has been a game changer when it comes to communicating with parents of my students who have complex needs – I wish I knew about to sooner! I’ve been able to not only communicate with my Spanish speaking families but easily form relationships with them as well!”

“I love that you can add other members like related services (speech, OT, PT) too. Overall all TalkingPoints is a fantastic app that is user friendly and has made communicating with families much easier!!”

What Users Dislike About the App

“Just downloaded, keep clicking the sign in with google (account already linked through computer) and the app just does nothing. Tried to sign in using email, and it told me ‘use the Google sign in button’.”

“It won’t let me log in on my phone/app with my school G account, which is the email I use for it. When I tried to just use my browser to log in it directs me to the app, that won’t let me sign in.”

“I used this app last year and had great luck in increasing parent engagement. The past few weeks however, the app has crashed everytime I open it on my phone. I have Uninstaller and re-installed 3 times….no luck.”

“I used this app last year and it was great but this year I cannot get it to load, when I open it the screen is just blank. I have tried un installing and then re installing as well as restarting my phone.”

“This doesn’t work. I created a teacher account and tried to setup a demo parent account with one of my cell phones. I received the SMS and was able to create an account, but never received any of the messages that I sent.”