Early Years (EYP) & Primary Years Programme (PYP) Implementation QuickStart Guide

1. Account setup: watch the QuickStart guide

The video covers ManageBac+ account setup and maintenance for the Primary Years Programme. It takes you through Classes, Standards, Units, Resources, Portfolio and Assessment.

The rest of this guide is a feature overview of ManageBac+ for the IB Primary Years Programme. Use it to get the most out of each area once your account is set up.

2. Curriculum

Improved unit flexibility, real-time collaboration and online presence for managing the IB Primary Years Programme (IB PYP).

• Collaborative Curriculum Planning: collaboratively create, edit and share unit planners across year levels in real time.
• Ready-to-Go: built in with transdisciplinary themes, key concepts, ATL skills and more.
• See the Big Picture: browse whole-school curriculum and analytics to track coverage of concepts and skills, and automatically generate your Programme of Inquiry.
• Resources: embed notes, files, photos, videos and websites with the drag & drop Lessons & Resources.

Redesigned Primary Years Programme Unit Planners

A host of improvements for your Early Years, Standard and Specialist (stand-alone) Planner templates.

Academic Standards & Curriculum Updates

Over 607 sets of academic & accreditation standards and benchmarks are available. Together they form the world's largest indexed collection of over 1.5 million fully-licensed academic standards.

Programme Standards & Practices

Built-in planner guidance and IB Evaluation support.

• Streamline the IB Evaluation process by tagging evidence as you go. Link Portfolio items, Reflections and Tasks to specific practices to build a rich bank of evidence centred on student learning experiences and outcomes.
• Planner guidance comes direct from the IB, including how each section of the template aligns with the IB Standards and Practices. This embedded PD keeps the IB philosophy at the heart of teacher planning and collaboration, and supports a culture of continuous reflection and improvement.

For more on the new IB Standards and Practices, read our blog.

3. Teaching & Learning

With a Curriculum-First approach and design, ManageBac+ supports effective implementation of the IB PYP:

• When you create a class, you choose from authorised subjects. Teachers can then share curriculum, resources, tasks and assignments with each other.
• Standards can be customised by Year Group or Phase, so you can differentiate units, resources and assessment tasks.
• When a curriculum review occurs, curriculum changes are automatic. This saves schools many hours each year and keeps the curriculum accurate and up to date.
• Transition years are handled for you. For example, PYP Year 4 would be on a new subject guide while PYP Year 5 stays on the old subject guide.

Classes

Staff can view events, tasks, deadlines, exams and entire calendars by year group, individual class or activity group (for example, Basketball Club). Students have their own calendar, populated with their assignments and activities and updated in real time.

Tasks

Create summative and formative tasks linked to units, custom categories and resources, with support for differentiation and task-specific clarification of assessment criteria. Students can upload work, with plagiarism checking through the Turnitin integration.

Supported file types: Websites or Videos, GDocs, Files (PDF, PPT, DOC, TXT), Photos or Text Notes.

Messages

Communicate with year groups, teachers and individual students to give feedback and suggestions, and to clarify tasks and assignments. Parents using ManageBac+ can also receive messages about their student's performance, alerting them to potential issues as they happen.

Calendar

Teachers and administrators can view assignment deadlines, exams and entire class calendars by year, group (such as Basketball or Drama Club) or individual class. Students get a real-time view of their term, as calendar items sync as soon as their teachers add them.

Attendance

Teachers record class attendance based on the configured preferences (for example weekdays and rotation-based, categories, days off). Admins can manage attendance by student, class or curriculum. They can set daily digests, send reminders to teachers and send absences to parents. Parents can also submit attendance excusals through ManageBac+.

4. Assessment & Reporting

Built for the needs of international schools, with built-in IB Curriculum support and country-specific assessment requirements in a mobile-ready interface.

Gradebook

Submit individual task and term assessments by points and anecdotal feedback, with customised category weightings and grade boundaries. Create term rubrics for all or specific subjects and convert them automatically to local grades. Administrators can track the progress of term grade submissions by subject or student in real time.

Google Docs

In less than 3 clicks, teachers can link, assign and distribute a Google Doc template to their entire class. Students get one-click access to their GDocs editor with the coursework template pre-loaded. The submitted GDoc is saved to their portfolio automatically, with all marks and annotations kept for future reference.

Turnitin

Student coursework can be submitted through Turnitin automatically before grading. This helps improve student writing, encourage original thinking and prevent plagiarism. All Feedback Studio features are available from within ManageBac+.

Annotations

Vantage Reader is the built-in tool for marking and annotating submitted coursework. Several authors can comment on and annotate the same assignment at the same time, as in Google Docs.

Report Cards

Report cards can include:

• A customisable cover letter with signature
• Learner profile and ATL skills evaluation
• Overall progress, including homeroom advisory comments and attendance
• Extra-curricular activities
• Final grade descriptions

Generate reports individually or in bulk as print-ready PDFs. You can also share them securely online with parents and students, with optional email notifications.

View Sample Report Card

5. Portfolio

Students build a digital portfolio over time as they submit coursework into their classes for individual assessments.

• Track Progress: track the progression of a student's learner profile attributes and ATLs through their learning goals and submitted work.
• Centralise Coursework: all submitted work is grouped automatically into subjects with learning goals.
• Export Locally: export portfolios as PDFs, or sync them to our partners when students take the next step in their learning journey.

6. Remote Learning

Bring your curriculum to life with a unified remote learning platform, with built-in Zoom, AssessPrep and KeyChat integrations.

Design

Three pillars supported by PD & best practices:

• Teaching & Learning: online lesson delivery with Zoom and Presentation Mode.
• Communication: whole-school communication with KeyChat.
• Engagement: engagement analytics and automated reminders with weekly digests.

Online Lesson & Presentation Mode

Schedule your virtual lesson with your own video conferencing tool or the built-in Zoom integration. Start the lesson with one click from your calendar or your unit's Stream.

Online Events & Meetings

The Zoom integration used for Online Lessons is also enabled for Calendar > Events.

1. Add an eventGo to Calendar and select the Add Event button.
2. Create the meetingIn the Event interface, select Create Zoom Meeting.

KeyChat

• Centralise Whole-School Communication: designed for the needs of PYP educators and adapted for Remote Learning. Channel membership is provisioned and managed automatically based on Class & Year group enrolment and Teacher & Advisor relationships.
• Improve Collaboration for Remote Learning: connects staff communication, school administration, and teaching & advisory relationships (for example homeroom teachers with specialist teachers, SL Advisors).
• Provide Social & Emotional Support: students can share how they are feeling with classmates and advisors via text or emojis.
• Enhance School-to-Home Communication: streamline parent communications to provide a Unified Family Experience.

AssessPrep

• Online Exams: securely manage remote examinations. Answers are accurate and easy to read for faster grading. Choose your exam delivery method, use the analytics, and assess by criteria or points.
• Live Invigilation: deliver assessments within a live, synchronous online lesson, and monitor students visually during remote testing using online meeting platforms.
• Flipped Classroom: assign assessments for students to complete asynchronously.

7. Mobile and School-to-Home

ManageBac+ for Mobile

For Students, Parents, Teachers and Coordinators. The ManageBac+ mobile app supports all user types, including students, parents, teachers, coordinators and admins, across all curriculum programmes. It covers key functions on tablet and phone: taking attendance, classroom management, messaging, and managing SA and project requirements.

School-to-Home

Give students and families a consistent, modern experience from initial inquiry to enrolment, school life and beyond.

• Teaching & Learning: curriculum planning, assessment and reporting, and academic management for teachers and students.
• Admissions & Enrolment: OpenApply, our School Admissions Management System, is integrated with ManageBac+. Families can update their information, confirm re-enrolment and complete applications for siblings in one place.
• Communications: streamlined communications and notifications support the school-to-home experience and increase student and teacher engagement.
• SchoolsBuddy: our Extra-Curricular and Activities Management System, integrated with ManageBac+. Schools can book and manage activities and parent-teacher conferences, with an advanced payments solution.