"Who wants to be a millionaire" technology comes to the classroom. When contestants on the show are stumped they can call a friend, have half of the four answers deleted, or poll the audience. The audience members have clickers with four buttons either marked A, B, C, and D or 1, 2, 3, and 4. The breakdown of the audience vote is displayed for the contestant. These clickers are now making their way to classrooms. In the classroom, the teacher can poll the students, their audience. While the clicker systems may have gotten their start as decision support systems, they are well suited to the classroom.
 Photo: David H. Myers, Dec. 2004
One of the easiest and most straightforward advantages of a clicker system in the classroom is solving the "deer in the headlights look." This look is the blank stare from your students' eyes during class. The eyes are open, they appear to be staring at the front of the classroom, but you are not quite sure if any information is being processed. Using the clickers to get an instant response from all students, a teacher can gauge the level of comprehension and determine whether or not the data has been processed and learning is taking place. If an adequate level of understanding has not been achieved, then the class discussion or lecture can be altered immediately to rectify the situation.
The clicker advantage is immediate class-wide feedback. The alternative is asking a single student or asking for a show of hands. Traditional methods may lead to less than a unanimous response or the random observation of the single student as an indication of overall class comprehension. Both of the traditional methods provide less than full feedback and thus introduce the possibility of incorrect conclusions as to the level of total student comprehension across all students. Instant and total feedback is the key to the employment of clickers in a class.
Another advantage of the clicker system is anonymity. The anonymity assists in discussions of sensitive topics, such as ethics. A broader aspect of the anonymity is the ability to get a wide range of responses and then prod students to explain the dispersion of responses or to explain another point of view without having the student reveal their own position.
If a class list is linked to the clickers by number, it is possible to track individual student performance either formally or informally. The technology allows for spreadsheets to be saved with individual responses. An informal method is to follow up with a student at the end of a class or a week with directed problems to aid the students. A more formal approach is to use the clicker system for in-class tests or quizzes. The clicker system collates the responses and calculates the grades.
Typical clicker systems require very little equipment. The clickers can be as simple as four buttons. Clickers systems can also be as complicated as having a mini-keyboard to input individual text answers. The size and complexity of the clicker system may be tailored to class needs. The other necessary hardware for the clicker system is a device to receive the responses. Receiving devices are either infrared (line of sight) or radio frequency. Both are usually connected to a computer for tallying and displaying results.
The software to create the questions and to tallying the results may be stand alone or integrated with a presentation package such as Microsoft's Powerpoint. Some of the additional features of the software are designed to enliven the presentation. One may include falling balls to count down the time left to answer the question and pie charts or bar graphs for displaying the results.
Powerpoint slide with simulated response data and countdown reminder.
Finally, a general observation is that participation increases across the spectrum of students. Those students too shy to raise their hand or too uncertain of their response have a chance to be heard through the clickers.
The clicker systems provide immediate feedback, anonymity, and are simple and straightforward to use. Student participation increases, teacher awareness of comprehension is enhanced, and the speed of the class is better controlled. |
