Teaching live classes

Apply to teach, set up your classes, invite the families you know, and teach on camera with the safety rules built in.

Teach your own class (sign language, piano, a science lab) to families you already know. Nothing is listed publicly: families join only when you invite them by email, and each family uses its own free Homeschool Corral account. Classes are free for now.

1. Apply

In My Homeschool, open Co-ops and classes and choose Apply to teach.
Enter your name as families will see it, what you teach, the ages, your experience and a short bio.
Read the rules for live classes, agree to our terms, and choose Send my application.

We read every application. You get an email when you’re approved, with a link to your classroom.

2. Set up your classes

In your classroom, choose Set up classes, then + Add a class. Set the day, the start time (Central time), how many minutes it runs, the first class and how many weeks, the grades, an optional size limit, a description and supplies. Families see your classes under Classes.

3. Invite families

Under Settings (or Families), type the parents’ email addresses and choose Send invitations.
Each family gets its own link that works only with that email address, for 14 days. They sign in (or make a free account), choose which children are coming and accept: they’re in at once.
The list below shows who has joined; Resend sends a new link, Cancel stops one.

Nobody can join without your invitation; there’s no shared link or code.

Families sign their children up for your classes under Our family; a full class gets a waitlist.

4. Teach live

On class day, from 10 minutes before the start until the class closes, 5 minutes after the end, a Start class button shows on your My Homeschool page and under Classes. It opens the class in a new tab with your camera and microphone. Students join from their parent’s account or from kid mode.

Recording comes first. Students come in only once you’re in the class and its recording is running, so a student can be in class with just you. You’re always in the recording; a student is in it only if they said yes when joining (it’s asked every time).
Chat. Everyone in class can type in the class chat, which the whole class sees. You (and helpers) can send someone a private message; students and parents can’t send private messages, so students can’t message each other. Everything said to the class, and every private message to or from a student, goes to that student’s parents: they can read it about half an hour after class closes, and get it by email every Friday evening. A student’s family never sees another student’s private messages. Outside class you write only to parents, under Messages.
Recorded, with each family’s yes. The class records itself when you start it, and each time you come back in after it stopped (for example after everyone left), a new recording starts; each one is saved and listed by date and start time. A recording opens with a title card and has a header with the class, your name, the date and the time; you are shown large with students along the bottom, and when you share your screen, the screen fills the picture with you in the corner. Your name in the recording is the display name on your account. You (and any helpers) are always in the recording; each student is in it only if they said yes when joining (asked every time), otherwise their camera and voice are left out. You see a short reminder that the class is recorded each time you start it. Families of the class and you can watch recordings under Classes → Recordings (not download) until 30 days after the class’s last week. Please don’t make your own recordings or photos.
Safety. Inappropriate words in the chat are masked. Cameras aren’t checked automatically; you can turn off any student’s camera yourself from the participant list. Only you and your helpers can share a screen.
The class closes on time. When class time is over, everyone sees a 5-minute warning; then the class closes for everyone, you included.
Chat goes to parents. The class chat is saved, and every Friday evening each student’s parents get it by email: everything said to the class, and any private message to their child. You can send a student a private message (for a quiet reminder); students answer in the class chat and can’t private-message anyone.
Report a problem on the class page sends a note straight to us, never to you or your helpers. Anyone in class can use it, including students in kid mode.

5. Lessons, the Classroom and class summaries

Classroom (in the My Homeschool bar) shows your next class with its Start class button, the classes coming up, your courses, announcements and recent materials. Open a course to see its lessons, assignments and recordings.

Lessons. On the course page choose + Add a lesson: its date, a title (“Lesson 9 · Photosynthesis”), notes for families and up to 6 files (PDF, photo or Word, 4 MB each). Families of the class see them on the course page; Edit changes or deletes one.
What students will learn. Edit the class and list the course’s objectives, one per line. They show on the course page.
Class summaries. After each class, its summary shows what was shared and assigned, the recording when it’s ready, and the next class. You also see attendance suggested from who joined (late means more than 10 minutes after the start); change any mark and choose Save attendance. Families see only their own children.

6. Try the new live classroom

Edit a class and tick Try the new live classroom to give that class our new class page. Your other classes keep the current one. Before joining, everyone sees their camera, a microphone level, a speaker test and device choices, with plain help if the browser blocks the camera, and answers the recording question on the same screen. In class there’s a control bar with Mute, Stop video, Share screen (you and helpers), Raise hand (students), People, Chat, Lesson (today’s lesson and its files), Background and More (speaker or gallery view, polls, the whiteboard, captions, Mute everyone, and device settings). Raised hands show to you in order, and you can lower one or all. Leave takes only you out; End for everyone (it asks first) ends the class for every student and stops the recording. Backgrounds work the same way for you and your helpers as for students (see For families below): if yours can’t start or stops working, your camera pauses until you choose what to do.

Polls, whiteboard and captions

Use them whenever they help, in either class page. Polls: you (and helpers) create a poll; students and parents vote and see the results you show. Whiteboard: you start it and it fills the class picture for everyone; students watch. Captions: what you and your helpers say is written out live; anyone in class can turn captions on or off for themselves. Captions are made automatically, so they can have mistakes.

7. Between classes

Announcements go to your families (by email too, unless you untick it). Homework shows in each family’s planner. Attendance works as in a co-op. Under Messages you write privately to each family’s parents, and they write back; you never message a child.

For families

Open the teacher’s invitation email and accept it (sign in with the email it was sent to), then sign your children up under Our family. On class day, a Join button shows on your child’s card in My Homeschool, in kid mode and under Classes, from 10 minutes before class. Sit in joins you as the parent. Your child goes in once the teacher has started the class and its recording is running; until then they wait on a screen that checks every 10 seconds. A student may be in class with just the teacher, and you can always Sit in. Allow the camera and microphone when your browser asks. Under Messages you can write to the teacher; you get an email when they reply. If something in a class worries you or your child, Report a problem (on the class page, and in kid mode) sends it to us, not to the teacher.

Classroom, in the My Homeschool bar, shows your children’s next class with its Join button (in your own time zone too, if you’re not in Central time), the classes coming up, each course’s lessons and files, assignments, recordings and announcements. After a class, its summary shows what was shared and assigned and the next class.

Each time your child joins a live class, you’re asked whether they may be in today’s recording (or your child is asked, if they join on their own from kid mode). Nothing is saved for next time, so you always decide. Either way your child has the camera on and takes part as usual; a no only leaves their camera and voice out of that day’s recording. To sit in yourself, you agree each time to be in the recording, because every adult in the room is recorded. Recordings are under Classes → Recordings.

In class, what’s behind your child is blurred to start with. Background (at the top of the class page) changes it: no blur, or a picture there: one of ten built-in pictures, or one of your own. Your own picture stays on that device. While a background is chosen, the camera is sent to the class only through it, so the class and the recording see the background, not the room. Backgrounds work on computers and on iPhones and iPads with iOS 16.4 or newer; some older phones and browsers can’t do them.

If the background can’t start, stops working in class, or the device can’t do backgrounds, the class page never switches to the plain camera by itself. The camera is paused and nothing from it is sent; your child stays in class and can listen, talk and use the chat. A note on the class page offers Try again, Keep my camera off, or Show my camera without a background, which first says that the class, and the recording if your child is in it, will see the room. Choosing no blur under Background shows the room too. Anyone in class can make these choices on their own device, a child in kid mode included, and the last background chosen on a device is used there next time.

A background covers what’s behind a person, not what they hold up to the camera or a shared screen, and around the edges of a person a little of the room can sometimes show through. For a room you’d rather nobody saw, keep the camera off.

Every Friday evening you get an email with the chat from your children’s live classes that week: everything said to the class, and any private message the teacher sent your child. You can also read it under Messages, in Class chat, about half an hour after each class closes, for a year. You never see another child’s private messages, and no other family sees your child’s.

If we pause a classroom, its classes, messages and sign-ups stop until it’s turned back on.

Open Classroom →