Best Practices & Tips

These strategies will help you get the most out of ClassMana and keep your students engaged all year long.

Point system

We have 4 kinds of points, each with their own philosophy.

In which situations are points given/taken away:

1. Experience: Reward good behavior
2. Health: Subtracted as a warning for unwanted behavior
3. Gold: Reward for good grades, but can also used as a more generic reward
4. Mana: Automatically rewarded on level up, to spend on powers and classroom privileges

Experience Points

Experience points are given for good behavior. It should only go up, although some teachers seem to subtract experience points as an instant consequence for unwanted behavior. See below how Health is a better way for doing this, since it allows warnings and student redemption, without a lasting impact.

Levels

Students level up when they reach predefined Experience Point milestones. Levels technically can never go down! Lowering levels would impact too many other things like equipped gear, acquired powers, etc.. The impact of lowering a level is too complex at this point, so therefore not possible.

Mana Points

Mana is used for powers and perks. Students gain it indirectly:

1. At level up
2. Scheduled periodically (configured by the teacher).
3. Given by the teacher (rather the exception than the norm)

Health

Health is used as warning signals for unwanted behaviors. Losing health doesn't have any real drawbacks or consequences. Only when health is lost repeatedly, students' health drops to 0 and they "fall". At that point there will be a consequence: they are not active in the game anymore until they redeem themselves.

Health should not be used for bad grades, not knowing an answer, at random, etc. This is only intended to steer unwanted behaviors.

Health should be restored automatically over time. This is realistic for a past unwanted behavior that was not repeated anymore.

Losing health can be mitigated by team members. That way they can encourage and help each other.

Falling

When the health of a student drops to 0 or below, they are not active in the game anymore. They can't receive Points and can't use their powers.

While losing health can be considered more of a warning, falling to 0 health should have some kind of consequence.

The student should have some way to redeem themselves, which restores their health back to max.

The impact of falling should be temporary. That means it shouldn't have any lasting impact, and students that redeem themselves don't experience a lasting impact.

What could be the consequences?

1. Lose Experience Points? No, because this sounds like a real setback and so the bad behavior was not really redeemed, but has a lasting impact.
2. Extra work: Students might be assigned additional homework or assignments.
3. Cleanup duty: Students might be responsible for cleaning up after an event.
4. Time off activities: Students might lose time during a fun class activity.
5. Work on an alternative assignment during a fun class activity.

Not a random consequence, but a fitting one!

Increased accountability: Students become more aware of the impact of their actions on their own health and the health of their team.

Gold

Gold is the main reward for good grades. It can be used to buy:

1. Text scroll to gain experience
2. Mana potion
3. Health potion
4. Avatar gear
5. Classroom shop items.

Monster Battles

Since Monster Battles are pure academic performance, it mainly has impact on gold.

1. Student/Team good answer: gain Gold and maybe Experience
2. Student/Team wrong answer: nothing
3. Kill Monster: whole class gains Gold and some Experience
4. Draw: Nothing, but keep any points gained during questions
5. Lose: Nothing, but dropped questions means less opportunity to gain points.

The 35-Level Journey

ClassMana has 35 levels, perfect for a school year:

• Weekly level-ups: 35 weeks ≈ full school year
• Bi-weekly level-ups: longer progression

When to Give Strikes

Strikes are really warnings, and only when a student "falls", there is a real consequence.