Set up Families so family members can follow their child’s learning, contribute experiences from home and connect with educators. This guide is for owners and managers setting up their service in Mana on the web.
Families join through an invitation. Downloading Mana alone does not give someone access to a child.
Before you begin, have:
an Owner or Manager account with access to the correct service’s settings
the child already added to Mana
the family member’s preferred email address
the access you intend to give that person.
Enable Families for your service
Open your account menu and select Settings.
Select Families under your team’s features.
If Families Feature is off and you are ready to enable it, turn it on, review the confirmation and select Enable.
Check the separate Families 2 setting for the updated family experience.
If the setting is managed by your organisation, ask your organisation lead to change it. Families must be enabled before Families 2 can be enabled.
1 Families Feature and 2 Families 2 are separate settings. Both are enabled in this example. The Families Feature notice says it is managed by the organisation; check your organisation policy before making changes.
When Turning on Families appears, allow setup to finish. You can leave the page while it works. If Mana says it could not confirm that Families started, use the displayed retry action and check the result before inviting families.
Families 2 applies to current and future families for that service. A family with children at more than one service sees Families 2 if any connected service enables it.
Choose history for new family members
Decide this before families accept their invitations. It sets the starting point for newly connected family members while keeping the documents’ sharing permissions in place.
Under History for new family members, choose:
Share previous updates — make eligible information previously shared for that child available when the family member joins.
Start from their join date — show information shared after the family member accepts the invitation.
Select Save history setting and wait for History setting saved.
1 Choose whether new family members can see previous updates or only updates shared after they accept their invitation. 2 Save the history setting after making a change. Share previous updates is already selected in this example, so Save is inactive. The choice applies to invitations accepted after saving.
The choice applies to invitation acceptances after you save it. It does not retrospectively change access for already connected family members. Previous updates must have been shared for the child; this setting does not open every service document. Earlier updates added through this process do not generate a new notification for each historical item.
Check chat policy before changing it
Families may have different available conversations because your service and organisation control chat types. These include Family channels, Room and Announcements. Your organisation may lock a choice or prevent team overrides.
Review the available types and your organisation’s requirements before selecting Save chat policy. Mana warns that disabling a chat type deletes its chats and their history irreversibly. Treat this as a decision about communication and records, not a routine troubleshooting step.
1 Read the warning before changing chat policy: disabling a chat type deletes that chat and its history irreversibly. Organisation policy overrides team choices. 2 Checked rows disable chat types. Announcements and Family channels are unchecked and labelled Enabled in this example; these are example values, not recommended defaults.
Turning off Families Feature also has consequences: the confirmation warns that families lose access immediately and will need to be invited again to restore it. If you only need to investigate an access problem, use the checks below first.
Open the child’s Family sharing page
Open Journeys and use Search children to find the child.
Open the child’s three-dot menu and select Family sharing.
You can also open the child’s Profile and select Manage family access under Family.
Check the child, current connected people and pending invitations before sending another invitation. This helps avoid inviting the wrong person or creating unnecessary duplicates.
Invite the right person with the right access
Check the child, email address and intended access before inviting anyone.
Follow Invite a parent or family member to a child’s Mana profile for current screenshots, access choices and resend steps.
Confirm the family has joined
Ask the family member to create or open their Mana account using the email address that received the invitation, then accept it. If the address was wrong, correct the invitation through your service’s normal process rather than asking the family to use someone else’s account.
In Families 2, check Accepted, Invited and Disabled on Family sharing. Invited includes pending and expired invitations. An accepted account only sees content and conversations shared with it; inviting someone does not make every document available.
Send families Accept your family invitation and Get started with Mana Families. Introduce one useful action at a time, such as following shared learning or contributing a Memory from home.
Resolve common access issues
No invitation received: Check the address and junk or spam. Under Invited, use Resend invite from the person’s three-dot menu if available. Wait one minute after sending before sending again.
No access to the child: Check the selected child and whether the invitation was accepted through the invited account.
Wrong access: Open the person’s three-dot menu on Family sharing and choose an available access level. Externally managed access stays locked.
Connected but missing an update: Check whether that exact content was shared for the child and whether the new-family history setting applies. Check chat policy separately for missing conversations.
For channel synchronisation problems after these checks, Refresh Families Channels is available in Families settings. The page advises that refresh can take a few hours. Check the result before repeating it; contact Mana if the issue continues.
Get help with service setup
Open your account menu and select Help & Support, or email [email protected]. Describe what you were trying to do and any error message. Never include passwords or invitation links in a general support message.
If your service uses the Xplor integration, contact Mana for help syncing existing children and family accounts.