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It was — same operator, same app, same account, new name. Nothing you saved has moved, and you sign in exactly as before. The web address is still myperfectcadence.com while the change works its way through.

Verbalgerbil is in beta — an early version. Features can change, and things can break. It's free to use today, and if that ever changes you'll be told before anything is charged.

The database is backed up daily and can be rolled back to any point in the last 7 days. That is not a promise that nothing can be lost — during the beta, keep your own copy of anything you can't afford to lose.

Everything Verbalgerbil holds for you — students, lessons, notes, messages, invoices, payments — downloads from Make it yours → Your data whenever you want it, with nobody to ask.

The same facts, at length, are in our Terms of Service — beta status and availability, and what we do and don't promise about fees.

Verbalgerbil is built and run by one person — B. Miles Tharp — rather than by a company. Support, privacy and legal questions all reach the same inbox: bmilestharp@gmail.com.

There is no support desk behind that address — it reaches the person who wrote the app. It is also the address named in our Privacy Policy for data questions and deletion requests, and in our Terms for everything else, so there is nowhere else to be routed to.

A brand-new account comes with a few sample students so the app isn't empty — they're a demo, not people. Click around, then hit "Clear sample students" (on Today or the Students page) when you're ready to add your own.

Students → Add a student, then open their hub and hit "Invite to portal" — you can email the invite straight from here, or copy the link and send it your own way. When they accept, they get their own portal with your lessons, resources, and payments.

During the beta, Cadence logins are for students aged 18 and over. If this student is under 18, don't send the link yet — they'll be turned away when they open it. It's a beta limit, not a permanent one.

Schedule → "Book a lesson". Pick the time in your own timezone — everyone sees lesson times in their local clock automatically. Then where does this lesson happen? — the built-in call (nothing to paste, and nothing to send: your student joins from their own portal) or Zoom/Google Meet with your own link. You can change that on any lesson later from its ⋯ Manage menu — no need to cancel and rebook.

At lesson time, open the student and start the call from the top of their lesson screen. Your notes sit right next to the video. If AI lesson notes are on (they are by default — "Make it yours" to change), transcription starts with the call, your student sees an indicator, and a draft recap appears when the call ends. Nothing reaches your student until you approve it.

Hit "End lesson & save to history" when you're done. The lesson moves into the student's Past lessons (on your side and theirs). You can always reopen a past lesson from their hub's Lessons tab ("Open") to add notes, fix a typo, or approve AI focus items later.

Sign up at myperfectcadence.com with email/password or Google. You'll land with a sample roster of students already in place so you can click around and see how everything works. When you're ready for the real thing, go to the Students page and hit "Clear sample students" to start fresh.

Add a student from the Students page, then open their hub and use "Invite to portal". Type their email and we send the invite for you — or copy the personal invite link and send it yourself (text, WhatsApp, whatever you normally use).

When they open the link, they create their own login (or, if they already have a student account from another coach, they can tap "Add this space to my account" and keep everything under one login). Each student gets their own portal: their lessons, resources, payments, and messages with you.

During the beta, Cadence logins are for students aged 18 and over. If this student is under 18, don't send the link yet — they'll be turned away when they open it. It's a beta limit, not a permanent one.

Yes — for younger students the person paying often isn't the person learning. Open the student's hub → Edit details → "Parent / guardian": add their email and turn on recap emails. You choose whether the email includes your actual notes or just says a recap was posted.

We ask the address first. When you save it, we email that address once to ask whether it would like these — that first email says nothing about your student, because nobody has confirmed it's the right address yet. Nothing is emailed to a parent until they confirm. The student's hub shows which of the three states you're in ("parent not confirmed yet", "parent CC'd", or "parent said no"), and the same badge appears on the lesson screen, so it's never a surprise.

Once they've confirmed, each time you save a lesson's recap or homework the parent gets one email for that lesson — and once it's sent, re-saving never re-sends. If you saved a recap before they confirmed, nothing was sent and nothing is queued: just save that lesson's recap again afterwards and it goes. Parents don't get a login — your student's portal stays theirs — and every recap carries a link they can use to stop them.

From a student's hub or the Schedule page, use "Book a lesson" and choose once, weekly for 8 weeks, or biweekly. On the week grid, tap the ⋯ menu on any lesson to reschedule it, mark it ✓ Completed, mark it Skipped/no-show, or cancel it.

You don't need the grid for a lesson you already have open: the lesson screen's own action row has ✓ Mark completed, Skipped/no-show, ↻ Reschedule (date, time, duration) and 🎥 Change video (switch this one lesson between the built-in call, Zoom, and Meet) — each opens its own small panel right there.

The lesson screen turns into a wrap-up: the AI draft appears under the video, and a "Close out this lesson" card walks you through the three usual steps — review/approve the draft, ✓ Mark completed, and "Book the next lesson" (which opens the booking panel with that student already picked). Most lessons close out in under a minute, and everything autosaves if you just leave.

Every student hub has a Notes tab. Private notes are for you only — jot down anything about your teaching plan or observations. Notes you mark as shared with the student show up in their portal, so use those for recaps, homework, or things you want them to remember.

Build a reusable library on the Resources page. From there, a resource reaches a student two ways: attach it to a specific lesson — open that lesson and use "+ Attach materials" right on the lesson screen (the student sees it on that lesson's page and in their materials shelf, labeled with the lesson date) — or share it generally from the student hub's Resources tab for evergreen materials that belong to every lesson. The hub tab always shows exactly how each resource is shared.

Attach a link when you add a resource and the card opens the material — for you and for your students. Made a typo, or need to fix a link? Hit Edit on any library card to change anything, or delete the resource (it disappears from every student's portal too).

Every resource can carry tags (comma-separated, on add or edit) and an optional collection — a folder-style path like "Openings/Sicilian" or "B1/Grammar". On the Resources page you can then search across titles, tags, subjects and collections; sort A–Z or by recently added; and group the whole library by kind, subject, tag, or collection. No folders to maintain — it's all just labels you can change any time.

Pick Chess when you add the student and their lessons get a live shared board in the built-in call: moves sync both ways, with variations, chapters, and a position editor. Import any game by pasting a PGN or pulling the student's recent chess.com / lichess games, and track their ratings on the student hub.

Build a drill library too: add resources with the "Chess (PGN)" kind (paste the PGN, tag it), then mid-call use "From my library" on the board to deploy a drill instantly. Deployed drills stay out of the student's records unless you hit "Keep in lesson" — your library is yours. And when a live game turns out to matter, "Save game" puts it (with your annotations) on the student's shelf, where it opens as an interactive board they can replay any time. Chess files in your own library open on a board for you as well — never a wall of move-text.

Pick Tutoring when you add the student and choose the area (reading, math, science, writing, test prep). Test-prep students get a Score & Goal tracker on their hub: log practice-test scores by section, set the goal score and test date, and watch the trend — your student sees the same card, read-only, in their portal. AI lesson recaps are tuned per craft, so a tutoring recap reads like tutoring, not like a language class.

Yes. During any built-in call, hit ⧉ Pop out the video on the strip above the video. The call moves to its own window you can drag anywhere, and the lesson page gives the freed space to your workspace — board, notes, materials. Transcription and AI notes keep running, and ⇤ Bring it back here returns the call inline whenever you want. Students have the same button.

Yes — open "Make it yours" and add weekly windows under "When can students book you?". Students then get a Book page in their portal showing your open slots (in their own timezone), minus anything already on your calendar. Booking uses a lesson from their package (or their monthly plan) and messages you automatically. Leave the windows empty and booking stays coach-only.

Go to "Make it yours" in settings. There you choose your vocabulary (like calling a session a "lesson"), your pricing model (hourly, packages, or monthly), your real rates and currency, your video preference, and your cancellation policy. Students see your cancellation policy on their Payments tab.

Connect your own Stripe account from the Payments page. Verbalgerbil never touches your money — you are the merchant of record, and payments go straight from your student to your Stripe account.

To bill someone, open a student's Billing tab and create an invoice. The amount is prefilled from their rate, and you'll need the student's email on file. They'll get a Stripe-hosted page to pay by card, and the invoice flips to Paid automatically once it clears.

Pick per lesson: the built-in call (video right inside the lesson screen — no links, and AI notes work there), or attach your own Zoom / Google Meet link. Your student's "Join" button opens exactly what you chose. To switch an existing lesson — say a link is wrong or you want to try the built-in call — use the ⋯ Manage menu on the Schedule page.

There is nothing for you to send. The built-in call has no shareable link: your student opens their own portal and the lesson's Join button — which appears 15 minutes before the start — takes them into the same call you're in. That's deliberate, not a missing feature. A lesson address that worked without signing in would be a way into your lesson for anyone it was forwarded to, so the call is only ever opened by the two people the lesson belongs to. If your student can't find it, the thing to send is the portal invite — not a call link.

On the built-in call only. By default they're automatic: transcription starts when you join (your student sees a transcription indicator in the call — do make sure they're comfortable with it), and when the call ends you get a drafted recap, private bullets, and suggested focus areas.

The draft is private to you. Copy the recap into your shared notes if you like it, and tick which focus items your student should see — only approved items reach their portal. Prefer to trigger it by hand? Set AI notes to "Off — start manually" in "Make it yours".

The full transcript is saved with the lesson too — both you and your student can find it behind a "Full transcript of this call" fold on the lesson page. Because lesson audio is AI-processed and the transcript is stored, it's best for everyone to keep sensitive personal details — health, finances, ID numbers — out of lesson talk.

Transcripts don't live forever. We keep the text of the recording for 90 daysautomatically. The lesson itself stays — the recap, the practice work, the notes and the chat are not affected. The fold on each lesson page shows the exact date that lesson's transcript goes.

Yes — the built-in call has a lesson chat right beside the video. Unlike a normal video-call chat, it's saved with the lesson forever (perfect for vocab, spellings, and links), and you can edit or unsend your own messages. Both you and your student can revisit it any time by reopening the lesson.

Yes. Open the student's hub → Lessons tab → find it under Past lessons → "Open". You can edit notes, regenerate AI notes from the call's transcript, and update what's shared.

Always yours. You book in your local time; your student sees the same lesson in their local time; the 12/24-hour style follows each person's own device. No math required.

Use "Sign out" at the bottom of the sidebar, under your name and email.

You can only join through a personal invite link from your coach — there's no public sign-up for students. Open the link they send you and create your own login. If you already have a student account here (say, from a different coach), choose "Add this space to my account" instead so both coaches live under one login.

While Cadence is in its early test, logins are for students aged 18 and over — if you're under 18 we can't set up an account for you yet, and your coach can carry on teaching you as normal.

Your portal has seven areas — six if Practice doesn't apply to you: Home (your next lesson and a recap of the last one), My lessons (with join links), Practice, Resources your coach has shared, Payments (your rate, any open invoices with a Pay now button, your payment history, and your coach's cancellation policy), Messages to talk directly with your coach, and Account (your name and password, your phone number, how reminders reach you, and a download of your data).

Practice only appears for language and chess subjects — there's nothing to drill on the others. Below those, the sidebar also has Report a problem, Help, and Sign out.

If you're learning a language, Practice is your flashcards: the word, then the meaning, then three buttons — No idea, Almost, Got it. How you grade a word decides when it comes back: a word you know well comes back less and less often, and one you miss comes straight back in the same sitting.

Words your coach kept during a lesson land here, and you can add words you tripped on yourself from the same page. A word that has no meaning written yet isn't drilled — it waits on a shelf called “Waiting on your coach” and joins your cards as soon as they write one. Writing it is your coach's job, not yours.

If you're learning chess, Practice is drills instead: positions taken from the games and studies your coach has shared with you, to play out on a board.

Go to Payments in your portal and tap "Pay now" on any open invoice. You'll pay by card on a secure, Stripe-hosted page. Once it goes through, the invoice updates to Paid right away.

My lessons and Resources show everything from ALL your coaches in one place — filter by coach or subject with the chips, group them, and sort past lessons by date. Payments and Messages are per coach; use the space switcher at the top of your portal sidebar to jump between coaches there.

My lessons → tap any past lesson. Its page keeps everything from that day: your coach's recap, any homework and focus areas they set, anything shared for that lesson, and — on lessons held in the built-in call — the lesson chat (great for vocabulary and links sent mid-class). When a section has nothing in it (no homework that week, say), the page says so plainly.

Yes — every upcoming lesson in My lessons has a Cancel option. Outside your coach's cancellation window it's free; inside it, the button tells you plainly that the lesson will still count as billed under their policy. Your coach is notified either way.

Need a new time instead? Use Move this lesson on the same card — it opens your coach's open times so you can pick one yourself. (If they haven't opened self-scheduling, that page says so and offers to message them instead.) Moving inside the cancellation window means their policy still applies to the original lesson; the page spells out exactly what that means for your plan before you pick a time.

If your coach has opened self-booking, yes: tap Book a lesson (Home or My lessons) to see their open times in your own timezone and grab one — it uses a lesson from your package or monthly plan, and your coach is told right away. If the page says they haven't opened self-booking, just message them and they'll book you in.

You land straight on that lesson's summary page — recap, homework, the focus areas your coach approved for you, anything shared for the lesson, and the chat log. It's the same page you can come back to any time from My lessons, and it fills in as your coach finishes their notes.

Open the lesson it belongs to (My lessons → tap the lesson), find the Your work card, and hit "+ Send a file" — upload with a title and an optional note. Your coach sees it on that lesson and gets a message right away, so nothing lands silently. Sent the wrong file? You can remove your own submission from the same place — it goes from your coach's view straight away and the file stops opening for anyone who had the link. We keep a copy for at least 30 days (never more than about two months) in case it was a mistake, then it's destroyed for good.

Just tap it. Chess files open as an interactive board right in your portal — click through the moves, branches and comments at your own pace. Games saved from your live lessons work the same way, so you can replay what you studied any time.

If your coach offers it, you can save a card on your Payments page (handled by Stripe — Verbalgerbil never sees the number). It makes booking smoother, and it lets your coach's cancellation policy work automatically: a lesson that's completed or counts as a billed no-show can charge the rate you already see on your Payments page — never a surprise amount. You're warned in plain terms before a late cancel counts as billed, and any charge that's about to happen shows on your Payments page BEFORE it fires — plus in your payment history and the message thread after.

On a monthly plan there is no separate switch to flip: your month arrives as an invoice, and your Payments page shows the next one — what it will be and when — before it is raised. Pay it by card with Pay now like any other invoice.

Account → Reminders & messages — pick email, text, both, or in-app only (per coach if you have several). The Messages page shows what's currently set.

On the sign-in page, tap Forgot password? and we'll email you a reset link (it works once and expires in an hour). You can also show/hide what you're typing in any password box now — no more invisible typos.

Tap "Join" on your next lesson (Home or My lessons). Depending on what your coach set up, that either opens the video call right inside your portal or takes you to their Zoom / Google Meet. Times are always shown in your own timezone.

Use "Sign out" at the bottom of your portal sidebar.

If someone behaves inappropriately — harassment, threats, scams, or anything that makes you uncomfortable — use “Report a problem” in your sidebar (it files straight to the person who runs Verbalgerbil, with your account attached, so we can follow up), or email us with what happened and who was involved. We review every report, and accounts that violate our conduct rules can be suspended or removed. Reports are kept confidential from the person being reported.

Report a concern

Signed in? The fastest route is “Report a problem” in your sidebar — it reaches us with your account attached. Or email us and tell us what you were trying to do, what happened instead, and what browser you're using — that's usually enough for us to track it down quickly.

Report a problem