Getting Started Guide
This guide is intended to help you set your school up on Times Tables Rock Stars. To find out how the programme will work, please visit How It Works.
Setting up your account
Follow these steps if you have received an email inviting you to become a Manager of your school's TT Rock Star account.
- Click on the link in your email.
- It will ask you to set a password for the first time. You only need to do this once.
- It will then take you to a sign-in page - enter your email address and new password.
- You will be offered 10 randomly generated rock names. If you see one you like, click on it. This will now become your rock name and it cannot be changed. Pupils will also have to choose their rock name the first time they log in - to avoid disappointment, it may be worth making it clear to them that the rock name cannot be changed once selected.
- You'll now get the chance to design your avatar.
- Once you click on the Save Avatar button it will take you to the Dashboard where you can begin playing or setting up classes (Bands) and pupils.
Adding Colleagues
Adding more teachers (Managers) is simple. Go to My School > Teacher Accounts and click on the 'Add A Manager' button and fill in the required details. A short email will be sent to their email address with a link for them to click on. That's all there is to it.
Adding classes and pupils
'Bands' are groups of players, i.e. usually your school classes or intervention groups. TTRS allows pupils to belong to two Bands at the same time, which we have called Maths Bands and Pastoral Bands. The Maths Band is the group that learners are in for their maths lessons and Pastoral Bands are for their form/tutor/registration group. In scenarios where pupils are taught maths in their form class, you may not need the Pastoral Bands feature at all. You may like to use Pastoral Bands to bundle all students from a yeargroup or school house into a single group or use them for competition purposes, lunchtime clubs or nurture groups.
You can create classes and user accounts for pupils very quickly by uploading a spreadsheet. You can upload every class in the school at once and it will create the classes *and* the pupil accounts at the same time (there's no need to create the Bands first). This may sound terrifying but don't worry, if the instructions and video can't help, just email or call us and we'll do it or guide you through the process.
Here goes...
- The quickest way to prepare a 4-column spreadsheet with the pupils’ first name, surname, class and yeargroup.
Save time by including several classes in one long list. If you want, you can include extra columns such as DOB, gender, form group, username and password.
Hint: As usernames for the pupils, many teachers use the pupils' school log-ins or their MyMaths/Mathletics/MangaHigh/etc log-ins. - Copy the data in the spreadsheet by selecting the cells from the top left to the bottom right and pressing ctrl & c (Windows) or cmd & c (Mac). Make sure you’ve included the top row (column headings) too.
- Login to the website and go to My School > Pupil Setup > Upload Users.
Tap in the large rectangle on the right so that the cursor appears and then paste by pressing ctrl & v (Windows) or cmd & v (Mac).
This will go smoothly so long as your spreadsheet is in good order.
- Follow the onscreen instructions as you scroll down:
- Match the column headings
- Check you’re happy with student preview
- Press the Upload button at the bottom
All being well, that should have done it! You’ll be told they’ve uploaded successfully and be given the chance to save the username labels.
If you have difficulties with this that can’t be solved in school, email the spreadsheet you’ve prepared to [email protected]
Setting the tables
As Band Manager (teacher), you can set up a 20-week practice schedule for your pupils with just a few clicks.
Note: Whatever you set will only restrict the times tables in the Garage and Arena games. Teacher accounts are not affected by any tables you set. Each week, the tables run from Sunday 00:00 to Saturday 23:59 GMT.
To get started, please go to My School > Pupil Setup > Set the Tables.
Strong advice - please read
We've tried out lots of different orders over the years and have two key pieces of advice.
- Make it easy to start with. The temptation, even with younger yeargroups is to give them the 2s, 5s and 10s altogether. Bear in mind that each table is made up of 48 facts, not 12, so by selecting just three of the tables, you're actually putting nearly 150 facts in front of the pupils. Get them off to an easy start so that they fall in love with TTRS and build up the confidence they're going to need when it gets harder. Give them just one of the tables (see next piece of advice) and make it an easy one.
- Related to the previous piece of advice, choose one table per week and then every third or fourth week give them a combo week. The most successful TTRS teachers combine the tables slowly, like in the example schedules below.
Week Year 2/Grade 1 Year 3/Grade 2 Year 4/Grade 3 Year 5+/Grade 4+ Week 1 10s 3s 3s 3s Week 2 10s 3s 6s 4s Week 3 2s 4s 3s 6s 5s Week 4 2s 4s 9s 3s 4s 5s Week 5 2s 10s 8s 3s 9s 6s Week 6 5s 3s 8s 3s 6s 9s 7s Week 7 5s 4s 7s 6s 7s Week 8 5s 10s 8s 7s 8s Week 9 5s 10s 3s 4s 8s 2s 4s 8s 9s Week 10 2s 3s 4s 8s 7s 10s Week 11 2s 5s 10s 3s 4s 8s 6s 7s 8s 9s 10s Week 12 2s 5s 10s 3s 9s 3s 4s 5s Week 13 10s 3s 6s 6s 7s Week 14 2s 4s 7s 8s 9s 10s Week 15 5s 4s 6s 7s 9s 3s 4s 5s 6s 7s
8s 9s 10sWeek 16 2s 5s 10s 8s 6s 7s 8s 9s 7s 8s 9s 10s Week 17 10s 3s 8s 11s 11s Week 18 5s 4s 12s 12s Week 19 5s 10s 3s 4s 5s 10s 11s 12s 6s 7s 8s 9s 10s
11s 12sWeek 20 2s 10s 2s 4s 8s 2s 3s 4s 5s 6s
7s 8s 9s3s 4s 5s 6s 7s
8s 9s 10s 11s 12sWeek 21 2s 5s 10s 5s 8s 10s 6s 9s 6s Week 22 5s 10s 2s 3s 4s 5s 7s 8s 7s Week 23 2s 5s 10s 2s 3s 4s 5s 8s
10s11s 12s 11s 12s Week 24 2s 5s 10s 2s 3s 4s 5s 8s
10s2s 3s 4s 5s 6s7s
8s 9s 10s 11s 12s2s 3s 4s 5s 6s7s
8s 9s 10s 11s 12sSubgrouping pupils
Within each Band (class) you can further group the pupils and set each mini-group a separate schedule of tables to practice. To do this, go to My School > Pupil Setup > Set the Tables.
From there it's just a case of dragging pupils into one of the 5 groups and setting a schedule for each one you've used.
Playing Games
There are four game types that differ according to which times tables the questions come from and whether it's a single- or multi-player game. There are slightly different reasons why you, as the teacher, might get pupils playing on a particular game type - it depends on the pupils (st)age, whether it's the first time they're playing, and whether they're playing to improve or to compete.
× 10Garage
Times-tables: restricted to those set in the Schedule (see below for how to do this) by the Band Manager. Roughly 1 in 5 questions are division.
Reasons to play in the Garage: we recommend the Garage is the default game to play as it's designed to help pupils get faster. After a few games, the TT Rock Star software engine starts to work out which number facts each pupil struggles with and then begins presenting those questions more frequently.
Garage is also the place to play if you have been using the successful paper version and want a smooth transition to the online version. We recommend that pupils play 3 times (a total of 3 minutes) in the Garage every day. It's up to you whether to play rock music while they practice :)
As the teacher, you can control which questions they get in the Garage so it's more appropriate for younger primary school children to play in the Garage, particularly as they start out with the 2s, 5s and 10s. It's free from the distractions of competing against other pupils and as an extra incentive, pupils get 10 coins per correct answer instead of 1. The focus, however, should be on competing against yourself.
× 1Studio
Times-tables: unrestricted, i.e. questions from 1 × 1 up to 12 × 12 are possible. Roughly 1 in 5 questions are division.
Reasons to play in the Studio: we would get pupils to play in the Studio to have a measure of their overall speed on all the times tables. Much like being in a recording studio, this is where we want TT Rock Stars to record their best performances.
The TT Rock Star engine works out your mean score over the last 10 games in the Studio and it's your speed in the Studio that determines your rock status. The more questions on average that you answer correctly in a minute, the higher your status. Starting off as a Busker you get to Rock Star if your per question average is 3 seconds, Rock Legend if it's under 2 seconds or Rock Hero if your average speed is 1 second or less per question.
Pupils may find it easier to understand on a per game basis, which would look like this:
If you answer 20 or more questions you're a Rock Star!
If you answer 30 or more questions you're a Rock Legend!
If you answer 60 or more questions you're a Rock Hero!Fortunately, because it's based on the mean over the last 10 games, a single bad performance doesn't have an exaggerated effect on the status.
× 1Arena
Times-tables: restricted to those set in the Schedule (see below for how to do this) by the Band Manager. Roughly 1 in 5 questions are division.
Reasons to play in the Arena: The Arena, like the Garage, is only for practising the times tables that you - the teacher - have set. The difference is that it's a multiplayer game for pupils to perform with other bandmates! Pupils join a game at the same time and compete to see who can answer the most questions.
This is not the most effective game mode for pupils to reach mastery (that would be the Garage) so we recommend the Arena for times when you want to inject a bit of competitiveness in the classroom or let them play in the Arena as a reward.
The premise of the Arena is the same as Live Mathletics or Sundae Times in MangaHigh, however the Arena's advantages are that the Arena games are one click away once logged in; they will accept 30+ users in a game (rather than 3 or 4); and you don't need to press play at the same precise second to join your teammates.
A few points to note:
- A new Arena game starts every 15 seconds (you can see the clock counting down.)
- There is no difference in Wembley, Millennium, etc. It just makes it easier for friends or for the teacher to tell others which game they want others to play in, e.g. "Everyone join Wembley!"
- Pupils don't face the same questions as each other.
- As a teacher, you will be able to see an Arena for each of the Bands in the school. However, pupils only see the Arena button for the Band they are in.
- This is probably the most addictive game mode. You'll have to figure out how to stop them!
× 1Festival
Times-tables: unrestricted, i.e. questions from 1 × 1 up to 12 × 12 are possible. Roughly 1 in 5 questions are division.
Reasons to play in the Festival: This is the multi-player version of the Studio - students face questions up to 12×12 while competing against players from around the world.
As with the Arena, the four different Festivals are to help you name the Festival you're joining. There is no difference in the format or type of questions between Glastonbury, Lollapolooza, etc.
A new Festival game starts every 15 seconds and there is no limit to the number of players that each game will accept (unlike Manga High, Arcademics or Mathletics).
