Frequently Asked Questions

Sign up for a teacher account, then go to Class Setup. Enter a class name and the system will auto-generate a unique class code. Add your students by typing their first names or importing a CSV. Each student gets a 3-character login code automatically.

Students go to the Word Labs home page, enter the class code, select their name from the list, and type their 3-character code. You can print login cards from Class Setup so each student has their code on hand.

Open the Teacher Dashboard from the landing page. You'll see a stats bar with class accuracy, heatmaps for every activity, intervention flags for students who need support, and detailed student profiles. Click any student name for a full breakdown. You can also export data as CSV.

Word Labs includes 13 activities: Morpheme Builder, Mission Mode, Meaning Match-Up, Breakdown Blitz, Phoneme Splitter, Syllable Splitter, Sound Sorter, Speed Builder, Root Lab, Homophone Hunter, Word Spectrum, The Refinery, and Flashcards. There's also a Spelling Check-In assessment tool. Most activities let students choose how many words per round (10, 15, 20, 25, or 30) so every game has a clear finish point and students are encouraged to try different activities.

Each teacher sees only the classes they are on. To share a class, your colleague joins your school, then you add them to the class in Class Setup under Teachers on this class. To invite them, go to Account Settings and look for the Your Team section. You'll see an invite code — share this with your colleague. When they create their account, they paste the invite code into the optional Invite code field on the sign-up page. They'll automatically join your school and see all your classes and data.

Stretch keeps a student at their current level but mixes in words from the next level up, so they meet harder words gradually instead of jumping a whole level. Use it for a student who is ready for more but not ready to move up, or to keep a student at their level while exposing them to what comes next. Attempts made with Stretch on are tracked separately from Level attempts, so you can see how they cope before promoting them. Turn it on for a student from the dashboard or Class Setup. It supports HPGE provision without extra teacher preparation.

Support Mode provides extra scaffolding for students who need it. When enabled, fuel bars drain at half speed, correct answers refill more, wrong answer penalties are halved, Speed Builder gives 50% more time, and multi-choice games show fewer options. Students also get visual hints like phoneme and syllable count badges, colour-coded tiles, and a "Need Advice" button that gives strategy tips and specific clues for the current question. Teachers can toggle it on per student from the dashboard or Class Setup (the SUP badge). Students can also turn it on themselves during gameplay — but teacher-set support mode stays on and can't be disabled by the student.

Yes — teachers can activate EALD support per student from Class Setup and choose from 48 home languages. Students see a "Show in [language]" button to reveal translations, plus audio pronunciation in both English and their home language. The English content comes first, with the home language available as a scaffold.

Go to Class Setup, find the student's name, and click the EALD button next to their name. Select their home language from the dropdown (48 languages available, including Arabic, Vietnamese, Mandarin, Hindi, and more). Once set, a globe icon appears next to their name. In gameplay, the student will see a translation toggle button — they tap it to reveal word meanings, morpheme definitions, and clues in their home language alongside the English. Worksheets and slide decks also support EALD translation columns when generating resources.

Teachers create spelling sets from the dashboard and assign them to individual students or the whole class. Start typing a word and choose a match to bring in its checked data, or add your own. If your school has asked for AI features to be switched on, AI can also generate morpheme breakdowns, syllable splits, phoneme splits, and clues for words outside the checked pool. Set words feed into 7 game modes: Breakdown Blitz, Phoneme Splitter, Syllable Splitter, Sound Sorter, Root Lab, Mission Mode, and Meaning Match-Up. Each assigned student practises All words or Struggling words, which is every word they have not yet shown they can spell. A word drops out once they have tried it at least twice and reach the level you set for the class. Spelling Check-Ins always test every word.

Spelling sets let you create lists of words (e.g. from your school's spelling assessment), assign students, and track their accuracy word by word on the dashboard heatmap. You can also run Spelling Check-In assessments — audio dictation tests where students hear and spell each word, with instant marking and progress tracking.

Low-stim mode turns off sounds, animations, particle effects, streak flames, leaderboards, and gamification rewards for the whole class. All game mechanics and progress tracking continue normally — it just removes sensory distractions. Toggle it on from the dashboard settings strip. Designed for students with sensory processing differences or anyone who benefits from a calmer environment.

Yes — the Teacher Resources page (sign-in required) has printable worksheet generators for 9 activity types, 287 teaching slide decks (PPTX) for over 280 prefixes, suffixes and roots, and printable login cards from Class Setup. Worksheets support EALD translation columns too. Slide decks can be viewed directly in the browser with a built-in fullscreen viewer.

Yes — when you open any activity from the teacher landing page, it opens in Teacher Mode. This removes timers, XP, and quarks so you can explore at your own pace. You get rich feedback explaining why answers are right or wrong (great for class discussion), a word count picker, and a Next button so you control the pace. Your scientist still reacts to answers for visual engagement. If you want to see the full student experience instead, use the "View as Student" button on the landing page.

The Featured Game gives 2x quarks and XP to encourage students to play a specific activity. By default, it automatically picks the game each student has played least or has the lowest accuracy in — so every student gets a personalised recommendation. Teachers can override this from the dashboard settings strip with the Focus Game selector to point the whole class at a specific activity. The featured game shows a gold glow and "2x" badge on the landing page.

Spelling Check-In is an audio dictation assessment. Teachers create a spelling set on the dashboard, then click "Start Check-In Now" to activate it. Students see a full-screen takeover on the landing page with a play button to hear each word (using Australian English TTS), a hint/clue, and a text input to type their answer. They get instant feedback — green for correct, red with the correction shown. Results are tracked word by word on the dashboard heatmap. Teachers can schedule check-ins or stop them at any time.

Word Labs is currently free during early access — every new teacher account gets full access to all features for 12 months, no credit card required. We'll introduce paid plans later, but early adopters will be looked after.

It's free right now. When paid plans launch, there will be an affordable Teacher plan (annual subscription) and custom school-wide pricing. Early access users will receive advance notice and special pricing. See the pricing page for current details, or email nick@wordlabs.app for a school quote. We support purchase orders and invoicing for school procurement.

Yes. Email nick@wordlabs.app with your school details and we'll arrange invoice payment or process your purchase order.

Student records are stored only in Australia (Supabase Sydney data centre, ap-southeast-2), and no student record is stored by any overseas processor. In transit, records pass through Cloudflare, Supabase's hosting and CDN provider, over encrypted connections. The website itself is served through Vercel's global CDN. We only store first names, a 3-character login code, and game scores — no surnames, emails, dates of birth, or photos.

Word Labs is designed to align with the Australian Privacy Act 1988, the Australian Privacy Principles, and the NSW Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 (PPIP Act). See our Privacy Policy, School Data Handling Agreement, and Parent Privacy Summary.

Yes. Deleting a class from Class Setup permanently removes all student records, progress data, and character data for that class. You can also email nick@wordlabs.app to request full account deletion.

Ask your teacher for your class code and your 3-letter code. Go to the Word Labs home page, enter the class code, find your name, and type your code.

Quarks are currency you earn by answering correctly — spend them in the Lab Shop to customise your scientist with coats, accessories, dances, and particle effects. XP (experience points) level up your scientist through 20 levels. You can see your total XP on the My Scientist page.

You get 3 daily challenges (easy, medium, hard) plus a weekly challenge. Complete them for bonus quarks and XP. You'll also earn streak badges for playing every day and variety badges for trying different games.

Go to My Scientist from the home page. Visit the Lab Shop to buy coats, hats, face accessories, dance moves, and particle effects with your Quarks. You can also pin up to 3 earned badges on your lab coat.