What is a clicker?
Classroom response systems, or clickers or polling, allow each member of an audience to respond to a prompt. Responses are immediately collected; the results are summarized and can be displayed as a chart for everyone to see. Find more details and considerations for using clickers on the Classroom Response Systems webpage from Vanderbilt University.
Benefits & Key Features
- Guide lectures by collecting immediate feedback about students’ understanding of lecture topics so confusion can be addressed quickly.
- Encourage peer instruction by having students answer a question and then have students with different answers partner to discuss their differences. Re-poll the students to see how the response has shifted.
- Facilitate class discussion by polling students on their opinions. Then discuss the reasons for their opinions.
- Collect data and perform a formative assessment on course topics or learning preferences throughout the cycle of a course.
Web clickers
If you plan to use clickers for occasional, ungraded, anonymous polling of student opinions, web-based clickers may be a good fit. PollEverywhere.com and Socrative.com are free web-based clickers that may be a good option if you:
- want anonymous, ungraded, occasional polling
- allow mobile devices (laptops or smartphones) in your class
- have fewer than 40 (Polleverywhere.com) or 50 (Socrative.com) students per class
Mentimeter is another polling tool used at Elon. It's easy to use but the free version is more limited than the tools mentioned above. If you're only planning to ask 1 or 2 questions per class session, it could be a good option.
What do I need to get started with a web-based clicker?
Create an account at either website and start exploring. You'll want to create a few example polls and test out the tool. They both have guides to help you get started using their platform.
All the tools listed here also offer paid versions that remove the limitations of the free account.