Using the Administrator Tool


	When you are register for the game as a teacher, you are given the option of registering as an administrator. Registering as an administrator gives you complete access to a robust Administrator Tool. As you know, unless you register as an administrator, your classes cannot play Lure of the Labyrinth. You can access the Administrator Tool from the options page that comes up after you enter your user name and password.

There are four main areas that you can look at in the Administrator Tool. Each one gives you access to specific information that can help you organize game and puzzle play, as well as monitor what your students do within the game.

Classes

This area is where you set up class lists and teams and assign your students the user names and passwords they'll need to play Lure of the Labyrinth. For more information on using this section of the Administrator Tool, look here.

Monitor

This is the section where you can monitor students' TPC messages and see their game bios as well. You can look at messages from each individual class, or messages from all the classes you have that are involved in Lure of the Labyrinth.

You can also post your own TPC messages for students from this area of the Administrator Tool. To do this, you should navigate to the Message Boards area, type in your message, and click to post it. Your message will immediately appear in the Messages section. Students will see it on their TPCs.

Most of your students' TPC communication is going to consist of messages in which your students are trying to brainstorm how to solve Lure of the Labyrinth's puzzles. Those messages can be extremely valuable to you since they'll represent your students' thought processes around the game's math content. As such, we think you'll be able to use the information in those messages to help shape the classroom teaching you'll do at some point after your students' game play.

Reports

This is where you can see all kinds of information about your students' Lure of the Labyrinth game play. You can obtain general class overviews, as well as detailed information on individual student's work on specific Lure of the Labyrinth puzzles. Finally, all of the data here is exportable into Excel files for your convenience and for simple and easy information sharing. The directions for building a report and exporting it into another program are built into this section. You do not have to do any fancy computing to get the information you need.

While the Administrator Tool's "report" function does indeed offer you a veritable mother lode of information, it is important to remember that this data should not be used as any kind of final assessment tool. This data will not show your students' pre-algebra achievement; rather it will give you information that you can use to enhance your students' pre-algebra achievement in the classroom. Again, as with your students' TPC messaging, we believe that this data can help inform your teaching and personalize it to suit your students' very particular needs.


	On the electronic versions of the reports, you can mouse over the headings to see an explanation of what kind of information is contained in that column.

My Account

This is the area where you can edit the profile that you originally created when you registered for your Administrator Tool account.