Quick Start Guide

Wondering how to start using Deck.Toys in your classroom? Let's get started!

Your First Deck
Interactive Features: Slide Apps and Study Set Games
Deck.Toys Classroom
Tracking and Report

1. Your First Deck

A Deck is a canvas or a Map where you can create an interactive lesson to engage students. You may add Activities and Paths to encourage students' progression. Explore the Deck Gallery for decks made by other teachers. All your work is auto-saved.

In the My Dashboard page, click on the + button under Decks to create your first lesson.

Next, give a name to your deck; for example, Training Material.

1.1 Deck Background

In your Deck Builder, add graphics to your deck by clicking on the ' Edit Background' button.

Choose from the default graphics, or copy-and-paste (CTRL+V) your own image to be uploaded. Click the 'Save and Exit Background Editor' once you have completed.

You can read more about making eye-catching Background Templates here.

1.2 Activities

There are three different Activities which you may use; Slide Activity, Study Set Activity, and Signpost.

Slide Activity is similar to presentation slides where you can import or embed the followings:

✓ Image ✓ Video ✓ Link ✓ Site ✓ PowerPoint ✓ PDF ✓ Audio Clips
✓ Questions with answer choices
✓ Interactive Slide Apps - Response, Supercharge, Mystery Apps and Tools
- All Slide Activities have in-built Immersive Reader capabilities.
Study Set Activity transforms your normal assessment tool into fun challenges and mini-games! All Study Set Activities have in-built Text-to-Speech capabilities, whilst Pro Plan users can upload audio clips.
Signpost is useful for a short introductory note to the lesson or the activities ahead, and has in-built Immersive Reader capabilities. You can only add GIFs and text to the Signpost.

You will need to drag and drop these Activities into your Deck Builder.

1.3 Learning Paths

Learning Paths are used to connect your Activities. You must click on the dotted lines to link up the activities that you have inserted onto the Deck Builder to create a path. A properly linked path will light up in green. Path Entry Point is where you expect the student to start the lesson path. It is possible to have multiple entry points, so be careful on how you are configuring the lesson.

After the student completes an Activity, the neighboring Activity will be activated, enabling the student to progress through the path. Adding divergent paths gives students the opportunity to self-explore on the challenges ahead.

The Activity Entry Lock is a powerful feature to challenge students to find a way to unlock the activity before being allowed to go through. To add a lock to your Activity, click on the drop-down icon and select ' Set Activity Entry Lock...'.

1.4 Learning Paths and Activities Wizard

Use the Learning Paths and Activities Wizard to automagically create a lesson in minutes! Read about the 6 different lesson designs here:

https://blog.deck.toys/6-ways-to-design-a-deck/

1.5 Preview Deck

Preview the current deck in the Test Classroom by clicking on ' Preview Deck' to view as a Teacher or a Student.

The Preview Deck function is a sandbox for you to test both the Teacher's and Student's views where the Teacher’s view is on the left and the Student’s view is on the right. You can the option to preview in 2 students mode as well to better simulate a classroom environment.

2. Interactive features: Slide Apps and Study Set Games

2.1 Slide Apps

Slide Apps are used to get real-time responses from students during the lesson. These apps can be inserted in your Slides directly in the Slide Activity. You may also launch an app such as Buzzer from the Teacher Launchpad in the Classroom mode and the app will appear on all students’ devices instantly.

2.2 Study Set Games

Study Set Games are used as assessment or review tools in a lesson. You may prepare the Study Sets which usually contain the key terms/questions and definitions/answers for the material. The image is optional to be uploaded into the Study Set. You may upload your image or from Google Search.

Then, drag-and-drop the Study Set into the Deck to create Activities.

The Study Set Games can be used in three different settings:

✓ Single Player ✓ Challenge ✓ Classroom

Find out more about the different settings here.

Preview the deck using the "Preview Deck - 2 students" Mode to see how some of these games would function in the Challenge and Classroom modes.

3. Deck.Toys Classroom

Deck.Toys Classroom is the environment where all the real-time progress and data is tracked. This is also the place where Classroom study set games can be played in multiplayer mode. Your student responses are also captured in this mode.

Assign all your decks to the Deck.Toys Classroom and share the Classroom URL address to your students to get the full experience of Deck.Toys!

3.1 Create Your Classroom

Click on the ' +' icon under the Classrooms and provide a name for your Deck.Toys Classroom. For example: Math Class 2B

Students’ reports and data are stored in each Deck.Toys Classroom and thus it is important to create a separate Classroom for every class you teach.

3.2 Assign Deck to Classroom

Assigning the Deck to the Deck.Toys Classroom will allow you to track your students' progress in real-time and launch Classroom-only games with your students. You can assign private decks from My Dashboard or public decks directly from the Deck Gallery

However, if you are using a deck from the Deck Gallery, it is recommended to make a copy to your private deck first and preview before assigning the deck to your students.

If you would like to find out more about ways to assign a deck to your Deck.Toys Classroom, read more here.

3.3 Get Students to Join Your Classroom

At the start of your lesson, share the Deck.Toys Classroom's address to your students. You can also share this URL to any learning management system you may have, such as Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams, Canvas, Schoology and SLS.

If you are using Google Classroom, you may share your Deck.Toys classroom URL instantly with your students.

If you are logged into Deck.Toys as a Teacher, the Teacher's View will be loaded. Thus, if you want to see a Student's View, it is recommended to try connecting to your classroom address as a student with another device or using your browser's incognito mode.

Students may log into your classroom with their Google Account, Microsoft Account, or as a Guest Student. They can also create a student account. The only difference with a Guest Student log in versus other log-ins with passwords is that the student may not be able to come back to the deck and resume where he/she has left off.

When connected, students can immediately explore your deck at their own pace in Free Mode which is the student-paced mode. Switch to Teacher Sync to enable teacher-led mode and to lock your students' view to your screen instead.

To check whether your students have successfully connected to your Deck.Toys Classroom, click on the top-right button in your Teacher's view to see the list of students that are already in your Classroom.

4. Tracking and Report

Real-time tracking and collecting student responses is only possible if your students have been assigned a Deck in your Deck.Toys Classroom, so go back to Section 3: Deck.Toys Classroom if you have not done so already.

In your Teacher’s view, you will see the students’ avatars on the Activities that they are currently working on. This allows you to gauge how far they are along the path. On each activity, a green indicator shows the percentage of students that have completed the particular Activity.

At the end of the lesson, generate the report for your Classroom by launching the Report app.

If you wish to hide your student's avatar from the whole classroom, you may do so by clicking on the 'Person' icon. Switch the student's identity to be hidden. This feature will allow your students who are not confident in answering the confidence to submit their answers anonymously.

To retrieve the classroom report which contains the student's avatar, you will have to switch back the student's identity to be shown.

Read more about the Report app here.

5. Useful links

1. To understand what Deck.Toys is in a nutshell, read this: https://blog.deck.toys/learning-paths-for-lesson-adventures/

2. To summarize all the building blocks of a great deck, read this: https://blog.deck.toys/building-blocks-of-a-deck/

3. If you are looking to build escape rooms with Deck.Toys, read this: https://blog.deck.toys/create-exciting-digital-escape-rooms-with-deck-toys/

4. If you are ready to dig deeper into the gamification features, read this: https://blog.deck.toys/gamification-features-in-deck-toys/