Teacher guide
The short version first. Open a section only when you need it.
The first five minutes
- Open the yard, pick an activity, and press Host this.
- A room code appears on the projector. Students open this site on their devices and type the code and their first name.
- Watch names appear on the projector. When everyone is in, press Start.
- From there, you set the pace. Reveals and results wait for you, and the continue button always says what happens next.
Trying it without a class? Every activity has a Try it out button that shows your screen and pretend students side by side. Try one activity out before your first real class; it is the fastest way to know what your students will see.
What you need
- A projector or shared screen for the host view. The whole class watches this together.
- A device per student. Chromebooks or tablets are perfect. Students install nothing and never make accounts.
- Any device for you. A second device for the private teacher console is optional but handy for moderation.
What you control during a live activity
- Pacing. Payoff moments (reveals, results, winners) never auto-advance. The class moves when you press the button.
- More time. Whenever the class is working against one shared countdown (writing, voting, ranking, sorting, merging...), an A bit more time button sits next to the countdown (on the projector and on the console). Each press adds 30 seconds to every screen at once; press it as often as you need. Turn-based clocks, like the charades timer, keep their own timing on purpose.
- The teacher console. Tap Copy teacher link in the corner of the host screen, then paste the link into another window (if you're extending your display) or send it to a second device. It opens the console already signed in; the class never sees the PIN. One rule to remember: anything the projector's buttons can do, the console can do, and the console never jumps ahead of what the class has seen.
- Moderation. From the console you can hide any student response or remove a student from the room. A text filter also runs on everything students submit.
- Drawings. Activities with student drawings include a teacher preview step, so nothing hand-drawn reaches the projector without your approval.
- Sound. The speaker chip on each screen mutes sound effects, and it remembers the choice.
- The activity report. The teacher console has an Activity report link: a printable record of everything the class made (answers, drawings, results, the AI's summaries). Print it or save it as a PDF from your browser. It is built on the spot and never stored online, so save it before you close the room; when the room ends, the work is gone.
Quick fixes
| If this happens | Do this |
|---|---|
| A student's room code will not work | Have them retype the code exactly as it appears on the projector. If the activity already ended, host it again; each run gets a fresh code. |
| A student's device drops off the wifi | Have them refresh the page. They rejoin automatically with their work intact. |
| "Someone here is already playing as that name" | That name is in use on a connected screen. If it's the same student twice, they should go back to their first screen (or wait a few seconds and try again). Two students sharing a name: one adds a last initial. |
| You close or refresh the host tab by accident | Reopen it. The room resumes where it was, even if the mistake happens mid-activity. |
| Something on the projector needs to go | Hide that response from the teacher console. It disappears everywhere immediately. |
| A student joined late | Nothing to do. Late joiners drop straight into the current step. |
| An AI step feels slow | With a full class, AI summaries can take around 20 seconds. The room is not stuck; the screen says what it is working on. |
Privacy in one breath
No student accounts. First names only. Student work is deleted when the activity ends. When AI summarizes class answers, student names are stripped first and never sent. Full details on the privacy page.
Jamyard is made with support from assemblycode.org.