This guide supports managers setting up Mana for a single centre.
Welcome to your Mana journey! As the leader of your centre, you play a key role in bringing Mana to life. Setting things up properly now means less admin later, smoother workflows for your team and more time to focus on what matters most: supporting children's learning and growth.
This guide is for Centre Managers and Educational Leaders at a single, independent centre. You'll need to be the Mana account owner (or hold a Manager role) to complete the billing and team-management steps. It walks you through everything you need to get your centre Mana-ready.
To get the best out of training, we recommend you complete all actions in this guide before your centre's training session.
💡 Not the right guide for you?
Centre that is part of a broader organisation, onboarding your own team? Use Activating Mana at a centre level (centre-led activation)
Centre where head office is inviting your team and uploading children? Use Activating Mana at a centre level (head office led activation)
Organisational leader rolling Mana out across multiple centres? Use Activating Mana at an organisational level
Teacher or educator joining an existing centre account? Use Activating Mana as a teacher or educator within a centre
You will need:
a Mana account (you'll create your centre's team from it)
a payment card for billing (plus any promotional codes from the Mana team)
a list of your children and educators for bulk upload
your centre's philosophy, a writing sample, and your learning framework/s
parent and guardian consent before uploading children
To start, let's bookmark the Mana help centre, your one-stop shop for all of your ongoing Mana support needs: https://help.makemana.com/en/
You will see these icons used throughout the guide:
✅ Green tick: key action to complete
📖 Book: read more for further support
💡 Light bulb: tips & tricks
⚠️ Exclamation point: take note
Set up your centre account and billing
Setting up your centre account and billing details is quick and easy. It helps us tailor the platform to your team, makes sure the right people have access, and keeps your subscription running smoothly without interruptions.
✅ Create your centre's account in Mana
Log into your Mana account and select your Profile Icon > Add new team
Enter your Centre's name and select Proceed to Payment
✅ Add your billing information to Mana
After creating the account, you will be prompted to enter card details for billing. Add and confirm your payment method and any promotional codes provided to you by the Mana team to proceed.
✅ Success check: once payment is confirmed, your new centre team appears when you tap your Profile icon. If payment fails or your promotional code isn't accepted, email [email protected] before trying again.
Update your policies and communicate your Mana rollout
Follow the steps in this section.
✅ Create or update your AI policy
Using Mana involves the usage of AI. As part of your activation process, you will need to examine your policies and create an AI policy or update your existing AI policy.
📖 Read more: View our sample AI policy to get started
📖 Read more: View Mana's privacy policy for more information
✅ Communicate with your teams about the Mana rollout
📖 Read more: Common FAQs about Mana
Communications templates for centres selected to pilot Mana
Communications templates for centres selected to pilot Mana
Obtain parent consent
At the heart of our approach is the belief that children learn best when teachers and families work together. Parent consent honours that partnership, protects privacy, and gives confidence in how Mana is used, enabling your centre to activate Mana fully and set every child up for success.
✅ Communicate the Mana rollout with your families and obtain parent and guardian consent
📖 If you are rolling out Mana Teachers only, check out our sample letter and consent form here: A letter to families and consent form (Mana Teachers)
📖 If you are rolling out Mana Teachers and Mana Families, check out our sample letter and consent form here: A letter to families and consent form (Mana Teachers & Mana Families)
Set up your team and children in Mana
Use the bulk upload option to add all children and educators to your account quickly and accurately. This saves significant time, ensures no one is missed and prepares your centre for immediate use of Mana.
⚠️ We recommend the Centre Manager completes these upload steps in one sitting for consistency. Remember to obtain family consent before uploading children.
✅ Add all of your children to Mana via a bulk upload
📖 Read more: How to bulk upload children into your centre
This includes a bulk upload csv template
✅ Add all of your educators/teachers to Mana
📖 Read more: Manage your team members in Mana
✅ Confirm your educators have accepted their invites to join Mana
📖 Read more: Manage team members
✅ Success check: every educator appears in your Members list without a pending invitation. If an educator hasn't received their invite, ask them to check junk/spam, confirm the email address, and re-send the invitation from the Members page.
✅ Set up your centre's rooms in Mana and assign children to rooms
📖 Read more: How do I create a room/group and add children?
✅ Set up your centre's stages for journeys (note: 'journeys' in Mana signifies your cycle of planning, or individual learning plans)
📖 Read more: Customise your Stages of the planning cycle or ILP
Choose how key children are allocated
Key children give you a clear focus for the children whose learning you take particular responsibility for. The aim is to help you know each child well and work closely with their family, with contributions from the wider team.
Your centre can coordinate allocations so someone can check how responsibility is shared across the team, or let educators choose their own key children.
When Manage child allocations centrally is on, managers make key-child allocations and educators cannot choose their own key children. When it is off, educators can manage their own key children where their access permits. Restricted educator access is a separate setting and can also prevent self-assignment.
Managers can review these choices in Settings → Team Management → Allocations & Access.
Manage key-child allocations explains the manager controls. Educators can follow Choose your key children.
Personalise your centre
Follow the steps in this section.
✅ Finally, commence personalising Mana to your centre
This is where the magic starts to take place! Personalising Mana to your centre makes the platform more meaningful and effective. Every centre has its own routines, culture, and priorities: when Mana reflects that, educators see information that feels relevant, families feel more connected, and Mana supports your way of working.
📖 Read more: Configure team settings
✅ Add your centre's writing style (if applicable)
Find Team Writing Style under Team Learning for your centre’s writing preferences.
✅ Add your centre's philosophy
Find Team Philosophy under Team Learning for your centre’s approach.
✅ Add your centre's learning framework/s
Find Team Frameworks under Team Learning for the framework settings.
✅ Add your centre's service type
Find Team Profile under Team Management for your centre’s details and service setup.
✅ Configure your team's coaching settings
Find Coaching under Team Learning for the centre’s coaching settings.
You're ready for training when...
You have completed activation as a single centre when:
✅ Your centre account is created and billing is confirmed
✅ Your AI policy is in place and families have given consent
✅ All children are uploaded and assigned to rooms
✅ All educators have accepted their invitations
✅ Journey stages, writing style, philosophy, framework, service type and coaching settings reflect your centre
If any step didn't work as described, contact us using the options below.
Need more help?
The Mana team is not far away if you need help with setup:
📰 Visit the Mana help centre, your one-stop shop for all Mana support needs
💬 Chat with us in the Mana app: tap your Profile icon, select Help & Support, then choose "Talk to a human"
📧 Email us at [email protected]