Imagine this: you sit down for your weekly mathematics tutorial, open your notebook and start working with your group on a problem. Everything seems fine, until you realise that someone at the table has been quietly nudging you in the wrong direction the whole time. That person is the Saboteur, and finding them is now part of the lesson.
The Saboteur is a classroom game designed by Dr Jacques Masuret, a mathematics and statistics lecturer at Economics and Business. Loosely inspired by the Dutch reality show Wie is de mol?, the game plants 1 undercover student among every 9. That student knows the answers in advance and has a single mission: subtly steer the group toward the wrong solution without being detected. Everyone else has 2 tasks. Work together to solve the problems and figure out who the saboteur is.

Why a game in a mathematics class?

Masuret had noticed a pattern in his first-year Mathematics 1 for Economics tutorials. Many students arrived disengaged, struggled to connect with their classmates and carried mathematical misconceptions from school that kept tripping them up.

Standard tutorial sessions do not address these challenges head-on. According to Masuret, the game creates a reason to pay close attention, to talk to the people around you and to really engage with the mathematics, because the social dynamic depends on it. The project received a Didactic Innovation Grant from UvA’s Teaching and Learning Centre (TLC) in 2025, supporting the design and development of 15 bespoke mathematical challenges.

How the game works

Each session lasts 45 minutes and includes 3 challenges. Groups receive an envelope containing all the materials they need. Typically this is a set of printed instructions and an empty answer sheet that must be completed in collaboration. They have 10 minutes per challenge, during which the saboteur will try to misdirect their group members. After time is up, the instructor explains the correct answer and highlights the most common mistakes.

The format runs over 6 weeks. In the final session, students vote on who they believe the saboteur in their group is. The identities are revealed, and 2 prizes are handed out. One goes to the student who correctly identified the saboteur, and one to the saboteur who collected the most saboteur points while staying hidden.

Did it increase engagement?

The pilot, which ran in the 2025-2026 academic year, produced promising signs. The share of students describing themselves as very interested in mathematics rose from around 1 in 4 before the game began to 1 in 2 by the end. Students also reported being more willing to participate actively in group work. One student put it plainly: 'Honestly, I loved the game, and just the idea of having such an interesting teacher that he willingly spent his time to try and make studying somewhat less mind-numbing is already amazing in itself.'

Not everything went smoothly. When attendance at the tutorial was patchy, the rotation mechanic, designed to ensure everyone encountered the saboteur at least once, broke down. Some students also felt the 10-minute time limit was tight for the trickier challenges, and a few said they would have liked more time spent unpacking the correct answers after each round.

Masuret is already working on a second iteration for the next academic year. Plans include digitalising the challenges to make them easier to update, adding a bonus round to each challenge for groups that finish early and giving more space for feedback and explanation. He is also keen to explore whether the format could work in other subjects and year groups. The game was designed from the outset to be adaptable to several contexts.