Online Lessons With Skype

Skype is a free video and audio communications platform that allows you to communicate with students one on one or in groups. Available on desktop and mobile devices, Skype offers chat, audio and video communication, file sharing, and screen sharing. 

Signing Up For Skype

You can sign up for a free Skype profile and download Skype's free application on Skype's website.

It isn't required that you, your tutors, or your students have Skype profiles to use Skype for online lessons. Having profiles can help simplify scheduling and make online lessons with Skype more secure, so if you plan to frequently use Skype for online lessons it might be a good idea for students and tutors to create Skype profiles. If you'd prefer to use Skype as a guest, you can easily do that as well. 

What You Need From Skype To Integrate With Teachworks

To create Locations in Teachworks that link to Skype Meetings you'll need to first create the Meeting in Skype and save the unique URL that links to your Skype Meeting. 

You can follow these steps to create a Meeting in Skype and access the Meeting URL:

1. Go to skype.com
2. Scroll down to the section titled “Meet Now on Skype!”
3. Click “Create your meeting”
4. On the next page, click “Create a free meeting”
5. Click “Start Meeting,” or save the link for future use as a meeting space.

The link to your Skype meetings is permanent, and has no expiration date, making it perfect for completing the steps below. If you plan to create more than one Skype Meeting to use for online lessons (i.e. if you need 5 Meeting spaces to host online lessons with different students at the same time) you can follow the steps listed above to create as many Skype Meetings as you need. 

Adding Skype Locations In Teachworks

Once you have a Skype Meeting link you can use the Location Links Add-On to create a Location in Teachworks that links to the Skype Meeting anywhere the Location for a lesson is referenced. 

1. Enable the Location Links Add-On if you haven”t already done so. You can do that by logging into your admin account and going to Account & Settings > Integrations & Add-Ons > Location Links > Enable.
2. Once the add-on is enabled, go to Account & Settings > Locations > Add Location.
3. Enter a name for your Skype Meeting. Add the Skype Meeting link to the “Link” field. The link doesn’t include https://, so be sure to add that to the beginning of the link when you add it:

4. It may be a good idea to check the “Display Conflicts” box so the Conflict Checker will display conflicts if more than one lesson is scheduled for a location at any given time.

5. Click “Save.”
6. If you plan to create more than one Skype Meeting for online lessons, you can repeat the steps listed above to add each one as a Location in Teachworks.

Scheduling Lessons That Link To Skype Meetings

Scheduling accessible online lessons is easy once you've set up Locations that link to Skype Meetings. When scheduling lessons, simply select one of the Skype Meeting location in the "Location" field on the Schedule Lesson Form.  

Where Users Can Find The Link To Their Online Lesson

On the Calendar: Students, parents, and tutors can login to their Teachworks account and access their online lessons by going to their Calendar, clicking on the lesson, and clicking "View." The "Location" in the view lesson pop-up window will be hyperlinked to the Skype Meeting.

 

Lesson Reminders: If you've enabled automated lesson reminders, you can include the {LOCATION} merge tag in the student and family lesson reminder email templates, and lesson reminders will include a link to Skype Meeting Locations.  

Employee reminders include their lessons for an entire day. You can add the {EVENTS} merge tag to the Employee Reminder Template and the location of each of the employee's lessons will be included in the email reminder. 

This article has more information about Customizing Notification Templates.