ARS/SRS in Higher Education

Queensland University of Technology has released a "Take5" video on the use of keepads in their Business studies courses. It's nice to see one of our clients working with the technology to get better outcomes for their students.

A lot of what she says can be used within a primary and seconday based environment as well.

Audience Response Systems V's Twitter

There has been a lot of talk (twitter) about the value of twitter in conferences - particularly during presentations. In one case disparaging remarks about the speaker were shown on screen while he was speaking. This was also a hot topic on echalk over the last couple of weeks. I Sent the list the following to mull over.

I have seen twitter used well in conferences and very badly in a few others. The trouble is that although very powerful it's very unidirectional in it's scope (both where and what you broadcast), as well as very individual. It's like giving all the loudmouths in the room a bullhorn, and the result is that the majority of people just shut up (don't Tweet).

We need to make it more fun and try an change the behaviour of the crowd so that they want participate.



What is sometimes needed is a more directed and focused system that aggregates responses so that it is useful to both the presenter and the audience.

Another possibility is an Audience Response System from Keepad. Going from an individualised "keepad" (multiple choice) to an "App"(Responseware) on an iphone or laptop (text & multiple choice). It allows your keynote/presenter/workshop facilitator to direct questions or solicit feedback, but aggregate the responses instantly to get a more "majority view". This can help focus the audience on the issues or content rather than presentation style.

This can all be integrated into a PowerPoint/Keynote/PDF/OO/Prezi in both PC and Mac platforms.

By the way, I hope you like the new green theme - It's spring here so I thought it was appropriate.

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More PowerPoint resources - Science

NASA has a huge range of free PowerPoint resources for science - Here are a few I have picked up recently.

http://sunearthday.nasa.gov/2006/promotional/powerpoint.php

http://nightsky.jpl.nasa.gov/download-view.cfm?Doc_ID=236

http://www.mainsgate.com/spacebio/modules/lu_teare.html

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/airplane/topics.htm

Obviously these work great on their own but if you team them up with TurningPoint Questions peppered through the presentation you can get an idea of your student's understanding on these topics.

TurningPoint Anywhere

TurningPoint Anywhere for both Mac and PC has been upgraded!

TPA is now more Mac like for the PC - with a larger toolbar and more options. It also allows you pull reports in HTML format. So you don't need MS Excel to get your reports out of the data. There are obviously less reporting options but it does mean that if you do want to bypass MS products but still use TP you can.

So what does this mean -
Well for all of you who use Open Office or any of the online programs such as Google Docs (used with gears you can do some stuff offline), it still means you can get feedback from your audience, and get your reports.

Added to this is the opportunity to set up the questions, answers and correct answers from within TPA before running you presentation. You can still use the participant lists as well. This give a less on the fly feel to your presentations and fills out your reports with more information.

All this adds up to TPA being a great tool to add to your ARS/SRS grab bag.

TPA can be downloaded from TurningTechnologies.com

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Powerpoint Games

TurningPoint ARS/SRS/CRT (new one I discovered - Classroom Response Technology), uses PowerPoint 2003/2007 to display questions, answers and responses as well as run the session. If you want to add a bit more competition in to the mix there are the team and individual leader boards and the new wager slide.

What you can also do is replicate game show styles - Jeopardy, Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and even the Price is Right - and adapt them to your learning area. Again it is a way of engaging your students and making learning more about participation rather than just listening.

For a range of game templates here is a great source

Power Point Games

Adapt these for use with TurningPoint and the subject you are teaching and add a little fun factor to your formative assessment.

Audience Response Research

We have a few Universities here in Perth trialling and using TurningPoint in their courses and doing research on its effectiveness in both large and small group environments. There have been a few books published both here and over in the United States on the same topic.

Here are two that are available on (in preview) Google books

Teaching with Classroom Response Systems By Derek Bruff

Audience response systems in higher education By David A. Banks, Idea Group Publishing


So if you are interested in how others are using Audience Response technology, I recommend that you have a look at these.

Links to Universities using TurningPoint ARS

This comes from my colleague over in Sydney. Several universities are using TurningPoint extensively in their courses to get engagement from their students.

here is some more information about HOW they are using it

The following links have information about TurningPoint:

University of SA: Macromedia vodcast on preparation and use of TP Keypads in lectures:
http://breeze.unisa.edu.au/ars

University of Sydney: Faculty information on how to set up receivers on lecture room equipment. (out of date – TP 2006)
http://www.usyd.edu.au/ict/audiovisual/elearning/interactive_technology.shtml

Macquarie University: General interest site on TurningPoint (largely reference to US site)
http://www.mq.edu.au/learningandteachingcentre/blog/2008/10/03/turningpoint-student-respons
e-system/

Aboriginal Students and ARS

I got a great email recently from two of my clients Terry and Christine Hinchcliffe. Both of them have "retired" from teaching and are traveling up through the north west of Western Australia. As they pass through some of the remote communities, they offer their services as relief (supply/substitute) teachers and as professional development consultants. This gives them the opportunity to keep their hand in and to give support to those teaching in isolated areas that don't usually get to have a day of PD in their own school.

They took with them an eBeam and a Turningpoint IR kit. Here is what he wrote to me recently regarding his use of TurningPoint Audience Response System.

We have had considerable success with Turning Point at La Grange, Derby and
Wananami. As I suspected, the aboriginal kids love it. We have developed a
series of interactive stories where the kids "pick their own pathway" by voting
for a choice of decisions then hyperlinking off to other slides.

As educators who have specialised in Aboriginal education for most of their teaching careers, this is high praise. They have used the technology to engage students, and give them control of the lesson, something that most kids would love.

It's always great hearing success stories from clients, so if you have a success story you would like to share, please feel free to leave a post or drop me a line.