🔨 How to create a Whack-a-Mole activity

The Whack-a-Mole template is a high-speed, arcade-style game that transforms a standard quiz into a thrilling test of reflexes and accuracy. It is perfect for keeping students deeply engaged while reinforcing rapid recognition of facts, vocabulary, or math elements.

IN THIS ARTICLE:

• How is the Whack-a-Mole activity played?
• How and what do you type into Edit content for Whack-a-Mole?
• Where can I find some more examples?

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How the activity is played

The game features animated moles popping up dynamically from a grid of holes, each displaying a specific item or statement.

• The interaction: Students must quickly "whack" (click or tap) only the moles carrying correct answers or matching targets.

• The challenge: Moles appear and submerge rapidly! Hitting a correct mole awards points, while whacking an incorrect distractor—or completely missing a correct one before it hides—will cost the user a life.

• The bonus: Speed is fully rewarded! Striking the correct target immediately after it surfaces yields a high-value Time Bonus.

• Completion: At the end of the levels, the final screen displays the user's ultimate score and time. Students can review their individual accuracy patterns, see their mistakes, and post their names on the Leader board.

  

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Creating your Whack-a-Mole activity

1. Click Create Activity on your dashboard and choose Whack-a-Mole.

   

   
    

2. Add your content:

   • Instruction: Type a brief directive at the top so students know their exact target parameters (e.g., "Hit only the Prime Numbers!" or "Find the Irregular Past Tense Verbs").

   • Correct Items: Enter the exact answers, words, or numbers that students should actively hit.

   • Incorrect Items: Enter the "distractor" answers that students must actively avoid or ignore.

   • Image/Audio (Optional): Click the image icon inside any slot to anchor a picture to that item, turning the activity into a rapid visual identification task.

3. Click Add an item or press Enter to expand your answer lists. Providing a large pool of items ensures varied layout groups across game levels.

4. Click Done to save. Wordwall will compile your targets and configure the random emergence patterns for the arcade board.

   
    

5. Scroll down to Visuals style to add a creative style to your activity, or tailor the difficulty in the Options panel below the activity:

6.  

   • Timer
     • Adjust the countdown numbers to establish a strict time limit per level or session. In the screenshot, this limit is configured to 1 minute and 0 seconds.
   • Speed
     • Adjust the slider to determine how long moles stay above ground before submerging. In the screenshot, this baseline velocity is locked at 5, which can be dialed down for younger learners or turned up to test lightning-fast muscle memory.
   • End of game
     • Show answers: When checked, this allows students to see a full summary breakdown of your correct and incorrect item groupings at the conclusion of the game session.
   • Game mode
     • Multiple levels: Progresses the student through sequential, accelerating stages where difficulty increases dynamically.
     • Single level: Keeps the activity locked to a uniform, solitary stage loop environment (selected in the screenshot).
   • Levels
     • Use this slider to determine the total length or target item thresholds required for the activity. In the screenshot, this parameter is set to 10.
   • Answers
     • Switch correct and incorrect: When enabled, this advanced setting flips your entry logic, forcing students to hit the distractors and ignore the items originally labelled as correct (unchecked/disabled in the screenshot).
   • Bonuses
     • Toggle specialised items or rewards that can surface during gameplay to make the arcade layout more dynamic:
       • Extra Time: When checked, successfully hitting bonus targets adds extra seconds back onto the running clock.
       • Power Up: When checked, special gameplay modifiers can be activated to help students clear rows or freeze movement.
       • Points: When checked, hitting correct targets triggers escalating point value streaks.
   • Saving options
     • Apply to this activity: Saves these specific countdown, velocity, and scoring rules only for the single active game file you are currently editing.
     • More: Click this drop-down to find:
       • Set as default for template: Remembers these options as your standard configuration layout for all future games you build using the Whack-a-Mole template.
       • Revert to default: Clears your recent changes and restores the parameters back to your previously saved personal defaults.
       • Revert to author's setting: Restores the arcade configurations back to the original layout settings set by the initial community creator.

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Creating Whack-a-Mole with AI

You don't need to be a prompt expert to use our AI. It is designed to be intuitive and accessible directly from the activity creator.

1. Click Create Activity and select Whack-a-Mole.

   

   
    

2. Look for the ✨ Generate with AI button at the top right of the content table.

   
    

3. Enter your content:

   • Topic: Type a clear categorisation prompt like "Multiples of 3" or "Proper Nouns vs. Common Nouns."

   • Text / Notes: Paste summary bullet points, dictionary entries, or textbook chapters. The AI will isolate accurate targets for your "Correct" list and formulate plausible decoys for the "Incorrect" list.

   • File: Upload a PDF or Word doc. Wordwall AI will automatically analyse your text parameters, segmenting definitions or conceptual groups into clean correct and incorrect sorting categories.

4. Click Generate. Review the split columns, manually tweak or rephrase any individual targets if needed, and hit Done.

   

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Need inspiration?

Some examples of Whack-a-Mole activities have been created by our users and shared with the Wordwall resource community.