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Woot Math Goodbye FAQ

What will happen with my account?

Access to your account will be disabled for the 2023-24 school year. If you need access to your materials after that date, please contact us and we’ll try to help you.

What will happen to my data?

Woot Math takes your data, and data privacy, very seriously, and we are committed to doing so even as we sunset Woot Math (you can read about our policies here). Should you need access to your data following the disabling of your account, please  contact us and we’ll try to help you.

Why are you shutting down Woot Math?

We want to assure you that our journey does not end here. Woot Math technology continues to support Saga Education, and its mission to deliver high-impact tutoring to underserved youth. And, we are already in the process of reimagining some of our most successful offerings, including Woot Math’s Adaptive Practice and Polls. We will keep you updated on our progress. If you are interested in being an early tester, please sign up here. 

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Woot Math Says Goodbye

After much consideration, we have made the difficult decision to shut down Woot Math. This decision was not made lightly, and we understand the impact it may have on you. 

While our current products will no longer be accessible, we are excited to inform you that we will continue to host a hub of free, research-backed resources including, math and executive function games and PD, online activities, and community engagement at sagaeducation.org/classroom. In the coming days, you will receive detailed instructions on how to access these resources.  

Furthermore, I want to assure you that our journey does not end here. Woot Math technology continues to support Saga Education, and its mission to deliver high-impact tutoring to underserved youth. And, we are already in the process of reimagining some of our most successful offerings, including Woot Math’s Adaptive Practice and Polls. We will keep you updated on our progress. If you are interested in being an early tester, please sign up at the bottom of the page, here. 

On behalf of our entire team, I want to extend my heartfelt gratitude to you for being a part of this incredible journey. The passion and dedication you bring to your classrooms every day inspire us to continue developing new and improved products that can help move the needle in  education.

Warm regards,

Krista Marks,
CEO and Co-founder, Woot Math

P.S. Learn more here: http://sagaeducation.org/classroom
P.P.S. Questions? More details can be found here

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Woot Math is Free

Woot Math is now FREE – for everyone. This change is effective immediately. 

If you have an existing account, your account has already been upgraded, so now you have access to all of the content, including:

  • Adaptive Learning (requires iPad or Chromebook app)
  • Formative Assessment
  • Math Jam
  • Escape Rooms

You might wonder, what is the catch? The answer is simple, there isn’t one. As part of an amazing non-profit organization, Saga Education, we have the ability to offer this to you at no cost.

Not only that, but we’re working hard to bring you the next generation of Woot Math with more topics and more grades. Stay tuned!

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Woot Math in the Google Play Store

Woot Math Google Play Image

Woot Math in the Google Play Store

The heart of Woot Math is our adaptive software designed to ensure that every student can master fractions. We have spent the lionshare of the last 7 years working on making it possible for every single student to deeply understand fractions. This proven and beloved application was delivered into web browsers through Flash. Sadly, this powerful tool for interactive design is going away in January 2021.
No fear, in response we have ported Woot Math’s Adaptive Learning for fractions and rational numbers to a dedicated Chromebook App, which is available in the Google Play Store here. Woot Math also has an iOS app for iPads that can be downloaded here. In order to run the new Woot Math app on Chromebooks, they will have to support Android Apps. To find out if your student devices support Android Apps, please refer to this document. If the Chromebooks are managed by your district, then they also might require support from the district. Please contact your IT department for additional information (if you are the IT manager and new to Android Apps, see here for additional information). The minimum device requirements for running the Woot Math app are:
  • Minimum 2 Gigabytes RAM
  • 7-inch tablet or larger

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Team Mode for Collaborative Learning

Team Mode Leaderboard

Team Mode for Collaborative Learning

With remote learning in full swing in many parts of the world, teachers are searching for the best online resources to meet their students’ needs. Now more than ever, students need to feel connected to their peers and community! To add some fun to students’ online experience, Woot Math in Team Mode is an opportunity for students to come together in teams and collaborate on engaging, rich-math tasks! It’s a chance for students to work together, even when we’re all apart or social-distancing! And, it’s fun! Who doesn’t like a good, friendly competition?

While Team Mode is best suited for use in the classroom where students can talk and interact with each other easily, Team Mode can be adapted for use in remote environments. Screen-sharing capabilities will allow teachers to navigate through the Team Mode activity and display the real-time results and leaderboard while the students work through their own problems in teams using breakout rooms. In addition to Team Mode, Math Jam is a collaborative tool that works best in a remote environment!

Getting Started with Team Mode for Collaborative Learning

There are two ways to start Team Mode. Both involve finding some content either from your content or our library of free, public content. Click “teacher-led” to launch the assignment. The simple way to start Team Mode is to click the Team Mode button before you launch.

Launching Team Mode
By selecting Team Mode, you are opting to run the entire assignment with students in teams. If you want to start with individual mode and switch to Team Mode part way through, you can do that too. You can switch to Team Mode at any time by clicking on the hamburger menu in the upper right corner and selecting Team Mode. This will make the rest of the activity run in Team Mode. The next step is for you to put your students into teams.
Launch Team Mode from Hamburger

Make Groups How You Want, or How They Want

First, you decide the group size, making teams from 2 to 8 students. We’ve found teams of 3-4 are the sweet spot, but the choice is yours. You also pick how the groups are made. The groups can be made at random or picked by students. If you started Team Mode in the middle of an assignment, you can also have the software make the teams heterogeneously based on correctness of the last question. That way, you get mixed teams with some students who got the last one right and some who needed a little extra help. You can also make homogenous teams. We recommend this after a fun question asking about what hobbies they have or what kind of shows they like to watch.

“What if I don’t like the teams it made?” Great question!

The teacher has the final say over the teams, just drag a team member to a new team or put them on another team. We know that sometimes there are classroom dynamics where it is best to have some students not work with certain others or some students to work with someone in particular… the choice is yours. Below, we see a teacher moving Jeff off of team Shark, to team Cricket and then replacing him with Jefferson. Changes to teams can also be made in the middle of an assignment. You can use the list of team members on the left to drag a student to a different team.

Individual Work Time Before Collaboration

Team Mode problems start with individual work time before students collaborate. We’ve found that students have more to talk about and collaborate more evenly if they have some time to work on their own before collaborating. Each task starts with a two minute timer where students can’t submit until the timer is done, feel free to add or remove time as you see fit. We found that this solo time really pays off.

Time to Collaborate

When students finish their solo time, it’s time for team time where they can communicate with their team about how they came to their own solutions. Students have the option at this point to click on their team members’ names (see top left of image) at the top to view their scratchpad (right side of image) before they make a final decision on their answer.
Viewing a Team Mate's Work

Practice Math Facts While You Wait for Others to Finish

Team Mode also provides a way for students to stay engaged in math content while waiting for the rest of the class to finish using the math facts game. Students solve math fact problems and work on improving their recall and fluency. The game is just fun enough to keep (most of) them off youtube but not so fun that they rush through the real task to get to the game.
Math Facts Game

How Does The Scoring Work?

To incentivize collaboration, the team only earns a point if everyone on the team submits the correct answer. If just one student is incorrect, the team does not earn a point. Note: Everyone does not need the same answer, they just need a correct answer. Woot Math has tools that allow tasks to accept equivalent answers as correct.

This scoring method promotes collaborative learning since the success of the team depends on the success of each individual. Make sure you still hold students accountable for showing their own work. This is another great way to make sure everyone is engaging with the problem, not just copying answers. In a close race, teachers have the option to reward extra points for great work. In the event of a tie at the end, there is also a Tie Breaker option. You can find more details on the Tie Breaker and Great Work features here.

Teacher Tools

Running a Woot in Team Mode provides real-time feedback to the teacher which is great for making sure students are staying on task and moving in the right direction. All of this can be viewed by pressing the up arrow at the bottom of the teacher’s view.
Viewing Real-Time Student Work
As you can see below, the students’ work as well as the correctness of their answer is indicated in this view. The red border indicates the student has selected the wrong answer and green indicates the correct one. If a student has not answered, their border color remains blue.
Real-Time Student Work

Once the answers are submitted, you can see an aggregate view of the solutions. You also see three options at the bottom of the teacher’s screen: Student Work, Volunteers, and Bookmarks.

The volunteer tab allows you to reach out to your class and ask for volunteers. The bookmarks tab allows you to note work you’d like to save for further review.

Teacher Viewing Options
If asking for a volunteer, all students will have this screen pop up, and they can choose whether they’d like to volunteer or not.
Students Can Volunteer
This Student Has Volunteered
Since, Aladdin volunteered, his work will show up in the Volunteers tab. You may click the student’s work for a bigger view to share with the class.
Teacher's View of Volunteering Students

The fun of Team Mode really comes from the friendly competition that ensues. Teachers share the leaderboard after each problem that shows each team’s status and ranking compared to the other teams.

If you want a fun way to get your students used to Team Mode and the functionality of the scratchpad, check out Team Mode Orientation, a warm up that we made to help get your students used to Woot Math. To preview the activity, click the link, or login to wootmath.com and search for “Team Mode Orientation” in the Shared Gallery.

We hope you enjoy Team Mode and please don’t hesitate to reach out with success stories, questions, tips or questions.

Visit our page on Formative Assessment for more on how to use this free tool in your classroom.

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Introducing Math Jam

Introducing Math Jam

The pandemic has brought about so much change for all of us! For teachers, reaching students through remote learning has come with many unique challenges. Woot Math received feedback from many teachers early on in the pandemic that a collaborative whiteboard would be very helpful in promoting student interaction and learning! We listened to your suggestions, and we’re excited to share the launch of the Math Jam collaborative whiteboard!
Math Jam is THE digital whiteboard you need for your virtual classroom! It provides a space to work collaboratively with your students or have them work on their own. Math Jam offers an ideal way to upload your lessons in advance or add instructional content on the fly. The best part is that Math Jam really engages students in a math-friendly, online environment with premium math tools and manipulatives.
Math Jam collaborative whiteboard

How to get started

Math Jam is accessible from your teacher dashboard. Just click on the “Math Jam” tile to get started.

Math Jam launch tile

For a blank workspace, just set a password and then “Launch Jam.”  Math Jam offers two options for adding your instructional content in advance. To load content already available in Woot Math, click “Choose content.” You can then find and insert any existing Woot Math warm-up, quiz or homework task. When uploading Woot Math content, Math Jam automatically paginates your lesson so that it’s easy to work through with your students page-by-page.

Math Jam launch screen

If your instructional content is a PDF document or a JPEG image file, you can use the upload tool in the bottom toolbar to add content as you go. PDF documents will automatically paginate in Math Jam, but JPEG images will need to be manually loaded onto new pages. Use the orange toolbar on the left to navigate between pages or to add and delete pages. The teacher can set the pace by selecting the lock at the top of the page toolbar so that all students are locked onto a specific page. Pages can be reordered by dragging them around in the page toolbar.

Page navigation and file upload tools

If you’d like students to work in smaller groups, you can have each group use a specific page of the Math Jam. As the teacher you can pop around in between the pages to easily see what each group is contributing. There are some other great features like an optional timer at the top of the page, a chat window on the right, and all the math-friendly tools in the bottom toolbar. Below is an example of a Woot Math poll in a Math Jam work space. (Note that the scratch pad is constrained to the smaller right section, and there is no answer submitting or answer checking available at this time.)

Woot Math poll in Math Jam
While fraction bars and circles, number lines and dice are not new, Woot Math strives to bring them alive digitally so students really feel like they are interacting with actual manipulatives. These manipulatives are great for building models of concepts students are exploring. The dice and coin are awesome tools for lessons in probability.
Fraction circles
Probability dice and coins
For more advanced students, Math Jam provides an environment to write complex math equations using the expression editor.
Math expression editor

There is also a tool for building tables that offers the option to automatically populate values for a given function.

Math table

The built-in calculator provides answers as decimals and, when appropriate, as fractions.

Calculator
Stickers add some fun and provide a way to give and receive feedback!
Stickers for feedback

You will be amazed at how well Math Jam works to bring your community of learners together! Start Jamming today!

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Saga + Woot

Saga + Woot

Saga + Woot

I am pleased to share that Woot Math is now a part of Saga Education! 
Saga Education is one of the world’s most innovative education companies (ranked top 5 by Fast Company), having developed approaches to tutoring that are among the most effective interventions ever implemented. They have proven to be uniquely effective at helping underserved students get on paths to greater success. You can learn more about this remarkable organization, here.
First, don’t worry; Woot Math is not going anywhere. Part of why we are so excited to join Saga is that together we intend on expanding Woot Math’s tools for math instruction. Not only that, but we will now be operating as a 501(c)(3) non-profit and we will be able to offer our existing resources at lower costs.
Second, working with Saga’s team, we plan to launch a new product in 2021 to support over a million additional students. This bold new platform is designed specifically for online math instruction, including a shared whiteboard, and tools for exploring math all integrated into one place. 
You can read more about  Saga + Woot in the press release, here.
Over the last seven years, it has been our mission to help teachers reach more students. We have focused on building innovative technology in the areas that are the most promising amplifiers of effective teacher practice, such as tools for formative assessment, peer-to-peer learning and adaptive technology for addressing gaps in understanding.
More recently, we have partnered with Saga to provide their innovative program online, enabling them to reach more students and attract amazing tutors from around the country. Through that work, we have seen first-hand the impact that a caring, consistent, and rigorous academic and mentoring relationship can have on young people despite the challenges of circumstance they may face. 
Together, as Saga + Woot, we will work hard to support you in your efforts to provide personalized and challenging math instruction so that all youth have the confidence and academic strength they need to pursue their dreams. 
With warm regards,

Krista
Chief Product Officer, Saga Education

sagaeducation.org | wootmath.com

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We must do more than teach math

We must domore than teach math.

It no longer feels okay to be silent. As I watch the events in Minneapolis, Louisville and Brunswick unfold, I am filled with sadness, anger, and an urgency to do more.

Dr. Robert Berry, someone I have long admired, a beloved education professor, a past president of NCTM, a Black man, recently posted:

"To my mathematics educators, We Teach More Than Mathematics. We must engage in anti-racist and trauma-informed education in our daily practices...BTW, I’m not OK."

At Woot Math, our work is focused on helping teachers ensure that all students have the math foundation they need to succeed. But Dr. Berry is right. We must do more than teach math. We must work to ensure that Black students have access not only to a safe and welcoming place to learn but also a safe and welcoming place to live.

The truth is they don’t. In our country, they never have. While we have repeatedly been shaken by the brutality captured on video, the reality is that for the Black community this is not new.

As we strive to figure out how to do more, we have begun by financially supporting the Center for Policing Equity (CPE), an organization at the forefront of addressing bias in policing. I greatly admire the work of Dr. Tracie Keesee, a remarkable leader, who is the co-founder of CPE, former Deputy of Training at NYPD, and a retired 25-year verteran of the Denver Police Department.

We also plan to read, listen, and learn from our Black colleagues, leaders, friends. We will identify ways that we can support and amplify their voice, their power. They are not alone. We stand and act in solidarity with them.

Krista Marks, CEO, Woot Math

June 3, 2020

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Make Your Virtual Classroom Interactive with Woot Math’s Teacher-Led Activities

How to Use Woot Math with Video Conferencing

Make Your Virtual Classroom Interactive with Woot Math’s Teacher-Led Activities

Did you know that you can use Woot Math’s Teacher-Led activities and any video conferencing application to run an interactive and engaging virtual classroom? With the following tips, you can have face-to-face interaction, and share student work in real time for great discussions.
The Coronavirus is causing many (if not all) schools to close for normal operations. Distance learning is suddenly a necessity and teachers are scrambling for activities that they can assign to their classes and still have productive learning going on. But not all distance learning needs to be independent. By carefully planning a lesson with Woot Math’s formative assessment platform, you can have an engaging and productive discussion with your students.

Plan Carefully

Learning new software can be difficult. Be sure to practice operating your video conferencing software so that you are comfortable with it, and know how to share your screen or browser window, and how to cancel sharing. With a bit of preparation, you can avoid accidentally sharing the wrong window with your entire class!

Sometimes you may want your students to be focused on their work in their device’s window of Woot Math, and sometimes you will want them focused on your shared screen in the video conferencing app. Of course, sometimes you will just want the class to be together, seeing each other and interacting without any shared screen.

Use The New Slide Task for Instructional Content

You can create any lecture-style material you want to cover by inserting a “Slide” task into your unit, and then modifying the scratchpad. This can be anything you can create on the scratchpad with our digital tools, or you can upload an image or PDF as the content as well. If you already have your content prepared, you can upload it directly to a new slide by selecting Import Worksheet, below the new task type selector. When projected, the slide content will display on your screen and the students’ devices so that they can see clearly what you are talking about.

Slide task

Monitoring Student Engagement

There are several ways you can make sure your students are paying attention with Woot Math. The left-hand panel will display who is connected to the platform (the little wifi icon), as well as who has successfully submitted a response to the current task (a solid blue square next to their name).

Left panel

You can also use the live view of student work to see what they are doing on their scratchpads in real time. Just be sure to not share your screen when you look, or you will share that student’s work with everyone in the class. Read this blog post to learn more about live view.

Live View of Student Work

Class Discussion

Once the students have completed their work and submitted their answers, share your Woot Math screen with the class. Select Display Work, and you can review your students’ work with the class to help drive discussions, reveal common misunderstandings, and help keep everyone connected.

Display Student Work
To open a student’s answer and scratchpad, just click on any of the tiles. The X in the upper right corner will let you close it again when you are ready to move on to another example.
Student work open for review

This is a challenging time for all of us. We hope this approach may be useful for you and your students. If you have any questions or suggestions, please contact us. We are here to help.

Stay safe and stay well.

Visit our page on Formative Assessment for more on how to use this free tool in your classroom.

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Live View of In-Progress Student Work

Live View of Student Work

Live View of In-Progress Student Work

An exciting new feature just launched to help teachers monitor students’ work in real time with “Live View.” Live View gives teachers the opportunity to see what students are working on, without having to look over a student’s shoulder. Sounds great, right? Let’s dive into how it works.

Live View is available in any “Teacher-Led” activity. To get started, launch a teacher-led activity. Once the activity has begun, at the bottom of the screen there will be an arrow to pop up the “Real Time Student Work.” You have the option of displaying student names or not.

Live View Tab
To avoid accidentally displaying student work for the whole class to see, please follow the tip and freeze your projector screen before opening up the “Live View”. Remember, most projector remotes have a ‘freeze’ button that locks what it is projecting at that moment.

After clicking, “Got It!” a view of each students’ workspace will show on your screen. Scroll down to view all of the students’ work.

This view offers teachers lots of information about how the class is doing on each task. The border color indicates student progress: blue (not yet started), yellow (partially correct), red (incorrect) and green (correct). The border color changes dynamically while the student is working on the task. The color of the title bars show whether the student has submitted their response and if it is correct (green), incorrect (red), or not submitted (blue).

For example, in the screenshot below, we see that Jaden has answered correctly (and pressed submit), Alice has input the correct answer (but has not yet pressed submit), Jose has answered incorrectly (also not yet pressed submit), and Marc has not yet worked on the problem.

Live View of Student Work

This tool makes it easier to find students who need some extra support or help during work time.

Live View is also great for finding exemplars or common misconceptions to review with the class after submissions. We love how Woot helps teachers create a culture of learning from common mistakes, this tool makes that process even more efficient. After you find some student work you want to review, click the bookmark button to pull it up later. We have found that when reviewing student work, it’s good to focus on what the student did well, and what they can do to improve. A mix of praise and feedback helps with confidence and keeps students motivated to improve. Also, bookmarks are anonymous to help avoid social pressures around sharing work.

bookmark Exemplar Student Work
Seeing student work in real-time is a great formative assessment tool, allowing you to tailor your instruction based on students’ current needs and understanding. You can quickly review what everyone in the class is doing, all in real time! In addition to helping you give support during work time, this feature supports teachers in finding pieces of student work to highlight when reviewing the task. Exemplars and common mistakes are great ways to communicate expectations to students, leveraging the power of Woot Math.

We hope you enjoy Live View and please don’t hesitate to reach out with success stories, questions, tips or questions.

Visit our page on Formative Assessment for more on how to use this free tool in your classroom.

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