https://www.remind.com/ sounds like a great resource to use to both communicate with staff and parents. I'm not a regular class-room teacher, so I don't usually have access to these communications.
I do use Skype for communicating with my daughter and grandson, who live 2000 miles away. I'm not sure how you would incorporate that into a classroom setting. I liked Amazon for other things, I'm curious about the Amazon Story Builder and I like the idea of