The Newsletter module offers a simple and intuitive way of creating online newsletters for your school. There are many options available, which allow you to re-use content from your website, whilst also allowing the flexibility to add additional content not found elsewhere.
- Getting Started
- Managing Rows
- Adding Content
- Types of Content Blocks
- Image
- Divider
- Social Media
- News Articles and Blog Posts
- Calendar Events
- Photo Albums
- Preview, Save and Publish
- Sharing Newsletters
Getting Started
- From the Add-ons dashboard, click onto the 'Newsletter' module, then click on 'Create a New Newsletter'.
- To begin, give your newsletter a page title.
Managing Rows
Once you have added a title you can start adding rows of content which will make up your newsletter, comprising of either 1 or 2 columns per row.
- Add a row by dragging from the right-hand column into the newsletter content area.
- Hover over the row and you will see a set of tools allowing you to:
- Reorder items by dragging the row up or down the newsletter. The purple line indicates where it will be inserted.
- Set colours of rows using the paintbrush to set the foreground, and the paint bucket to set the background colours.
- Delete rows, including their contents.
Adding Content
To add content to a row that has been added:
- Click on the 'Content' tab on the right-hand side. You will then see a list of content blocks you can drag and drop into your rows.
- Select the type of content you wish to add, then click and drag the block into the row you would like to add it to.
Types of Content Blocks
- Text
- Image
- Divider
- Social Media
- News Stories
- Calendar Events
- Photo Album
- Preview, Save & Publish
- Sharing Newsletters
Text
The text block allows you to add text and make changes to the formatting, such as bold, Italics, or alignment.
- Drag the text block onto the page
- Click into the text area and type or paste in your text content
- Use the toolbar at the top to help format the text, insert hyperlinks and images, or add templates to allow you to include buttons, tables and accordions within your newsletters.
Image
The Image block allows you to fill a content block with an image. You can either drag your image directly from your computer, or you can click on the 'Browse' button and select an image from the File Manager.
- Drag the Image block onto the page
- Either drag an image from your computer onto the block or, click on the 'Browse' button to select an image from the File Manager.
- Use the toolbar at the top to help format the image, you can choose to set a title and set the width of the image.
Divider
The divider will add a horizontal line between two rows. The divider row can only be inserted into a 1 column row.
- Drag and drop the divider block onto an empty row
- If you wish, you can set the row background colour
- Use the toolbar at the top to select the width & style of the line
Social Media
The Social media block allows you to display a feed from either Facebook or Twitter.
- Drag the Social Media block to an empty row.
- Use the toolbar at the top to choose the type of feed to display (Facebook / Twitter).
- Set the feed handle.
- Choose the style - There are options to allow images to show if required.
- Set the number of posts to be displayed.
News Articles & Blog Posts
The News & Blog content blocks allow you to pull in items already published to your website.
- Drag the block into an empty row.
- Choose the news/blog category you would like to select from.
- Toggle on the 'Select Items' option, to allow you to specify exactly which item(s) to pull through.
- Toggle on the 'Select Items' option, to allow you to specify exactly which item(s) to pull through.
- Set the number of items you want to be displayed. The section will format appropriately depending on the number of items chosen.
- Select the date range.
- You may also wish to set a block title.
Calendar Events
The Calendar Events block allows you to pull in a series of upcoming events from the calendar in your website.
- Drag the events block into an empty row in your newsletter.
- Choose the calendar category the events will be pulled from.
- Select of events displayed.
- Set the date range for the calendar events to pull.
Photo Albums
The Photo Albums block allows you to display a block of images from a selected photo album within the website.
- Drag the Photos block into an empty row in your newsletter.
- Select the album the images will be displayed from.
- Set the number of images that will be included in the newsletter.
- Click Select Items to choose the specific photos within the album that you would like to display.
Preview, Save & Publish
At any time, you can click preview to check how your newsletter will look when published.
From the preview window, you can:
- Save Draft - you can leave the site and return later to continue working on the draft item.
- Save as Template - you can access a template later, and use it to create a new newsletter with the same layout.
- Publish - this option will make the newsletter live so that you can share it publicly
- Publish & Send - this option is only available if you have purchased the email module. It will publish the newsletter and also open the email tool to allow you to send the newsletter.
Sharing Newsletters
If you do not have the e4education email tool, once you have published your newsletter, you will need to obtain the link to share with parents.
- To obtain a direct link, find the newsletter from the list and then click 'View Online'.
- Alternatively, you may wish to add a list of published newsletters to any page on your site using the Component Tool.