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Class Join Settings and Approving Students to Join
Class Join Settings and Approving Students to Join

Learn how students join your class, and how to set your classes to be open to join or join by approval.

Matheus Froes avatar
Written by Matheus Froes
Updated over a week ago

Once you've Created a Class, you will want your students to join.

This article includes:

  • How students join your class

  • How to set classes to be open, join by approval, or closed

  • How to approve students to join your class

How students join your class:

  1. First, find your class code by clicking into the class and clicking the Wrench icon. Your class code will show beside Class Settings.

  2. Next, you can privately give this code to your students, who can log in to their Showbie accounts to join the class. (Please do not post class codes in public places.)

  3. In the top right of their student account is a + button. They can click this and type in your code to join your class.

Joining a class in a student account.

If your class is set to Open to Join, then the student will be joined to the class immediately. They will be able to see assignments and join in the class discussion right away.

If your class is set to Join by Approval, then the student will get a message saying "Waiting to Join Class", and won't be able to see the class content until you approve them.

What it looks like in a student account when they are waiting to join a class.

How to set classes to be open, join by approval, or closed

Open

By default, when you create a class it will be open for students to join. When a class is open to join, students can enter your class code, and right away they will be admitted to your class and can see all the content.

After two weeks of being open, the class will automatically change to join by approval. This is done automatically, so you don't need to remember to switch your class to join by approval to keep them secure.

By Approval

Join by approval means when students join your class, they will see a message saying "Waiting to Join Class" and won't see the class content until you approve them to join.

Closed

Closed means that no new students can join the class.

We recommend that after all your students have joined the class, switch the class to join by approval, or closed. This helps keep your class secure.

To change your class settings from open to join by approval, closed, or vice versa:

  1. Go to the class and click the Wrench icon, select Class Settings.

  2. Click on the Class Code.

  3. You can then select registration Open or By Approval, and hit Save.

If you set registration to be open, it will automatically switch to join by approval after 2 weeks.

Switching your class from open to join to join by approval.

How to approve students to join your class

If your class is set to join by approval, once a student enters the code to join your class, you will get a push or email notification to let you know they are waiting to be approved to join.

Example email notification of a student waiting to join a class.

You can click into the email notification to go into Showbie to approve them to join. Or you can go into your Showbie account, go to the class, and click the Wrench, and select Class Members.

You'll then see the pending request, and can tap the checkmark to approve them, or 'X' to block them from the class. If you block a student from a class, you can aways Unblock them later.

If you do not recognize a student who is requesting to join your class, wait to approve them once you've verified they are supposed to be part of your class.

Approve or block students requesting to join your class in the class members section.

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