Jottings are a fantastic way to quickly capture observations using text, images, or voice recordings. These short entries allow you to gather important insights about a child’s learning and development over time, which you can later craft into a meaningful Learning Story, Diary Entry, or Letter if desired or just keep on file.
Using jottings helps you document spontaneous moments and important notes from conversations with family members, key workers and other professionals.
There are two ways to create a Jotting in Mana:
1. Within a Child’s Learning Journey
You can add a Jotting under one of the stages in the child’s Learning Journey. This is ideal when you want to quickly document the child’s progress as part of their cycle of planning.
2. In Docs
If you’re creating a one-off jotting that doesn’t need to be part of a specific planning cycle, you can do so directly in the Docs section. This is perfect for standalone jotting that captures a key moment or unique experiences.
Creating a Jotting Within a Child’s Learning Journey
This method is ideal for adding a jotting as part of a child’s ongoing learning journey and planning cycle.
Navigate to the Journeys feature
Select an existing child profile or select "+ New child" to create a new child profile
Select an existing Journey for the child or select "+ New journey" to start a new cycle of planning/ILP
Select "+Doc" under the relevant Stage (e.g Family input/ Observe/ Implement etc.)
Click the button mentioning the document type, and from the options, select "Jotting" (unless already set to Jotting).
Start Recording (ensure you enable microphone access) or type in your notes and click submit
Quick tip: You can record your voice in any language that you feel comfortable in and it will translate your voice memo into English.
2. Creating a One-Off Jotting in Docs
If you’re creating a standalone Jotting that isn’t tied to a Learning Journey, use the Docs section.
From the main left side panel, navigate to the Docs section.
Click the ‘+Doc’ button.
Select Jotting, link child (optional) and click "Create Jotting".
Start Recording (ensure you enable microphone access) or type in your notes and click submit
It will now be stored in the Docs section.
Happy Jotting!