Formative Assessment with Plickers

Formative assessment helps teachers make data-informed decisions to plan for and/or adjust instructional activities, identify potential misconceptions, monitor the pace of instruction, etc.

While there are many ways to formatively assess students, I recently saw Eric Sheninger use Plickers during his workshop at the Ventura County Office of Education, and thought, what an easy and inexpensive way to quickly assess groups!
Purpose and benefits
  • Collect data from multiple choice or true/false questions from a group.
  • View data as a group snapshot in a graph, or view individual data from audience.
  • Quick, low-tech tool to use, especially when you don't have the budget for clickers.
Technology and prep
  1. Teacher/Facilitator creates an account at Plickers.
  2. Download app for portable device: iTunes or Google Play.
  3. Print out a set of reusable cards.  
  4. Add class(es).
  5. Create questions.
Getting started 

Click here to download as PDF
Last thoughts

Multiple choice and true/false responses provide limited data of learning and understanding. However, it can be used as a quick assessment to make data-informed decisions and to spark discussions for deeper learning in the classroom, a staff meeting, or the workshop setting.
  • How do you use technology to make you more effective, efficient, and informed?
  • What other tools do you like to use to gather information from your audience?

Comments

  1. AnonymousDecember 2, 2014 at 10:21 AM

    I love how simple this is to understand! What software did you use for the pics? Thank you!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tracy WatanabeDecember 2, 2014 at 10:49 AM

      Thanks! I'm glad this is useful! I used Pages to create the pics.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Directions for posting:

1) Choose "Comment As" first. If you don't have a Google/Blogger account, you can choose Name/URL and type in your name, then place the web site that best describes you in the URL (i.e. www.ajusd.org). Or, you can choose "Anonymous".

2) You may need to press "Post Comment" more than one time.

It is always wise to copy your comment before pressing "Post Comment" just in case something happens.

3) Type in the word verification.

4) If you did everything correctly, it will state, "Your comment has been saved and will be visible after blog owner approval." If you do not get that message, please try again.

Click here for a tutorial on how to comment.

Thank you!

Popular posts from this blog

Quality Blogging and Commenting Audit Meme

Image
Silvia Tolisano (@langwitches) challenges us in a meme to audit blogs and comments to raise awareness of quality blogging. I'm honored that both Kathleen Morris and Sheri Edwards tagged me in this meme. Here is Silvia's meme challenge : Select a blog post or blog comment to audit (Professional or Student) Take a screenshot or copy and paste the post or comment into your blog post (be sensitive whether you want to reveal any names or references) Include or link to the rubric you use to assess the quality of post or comment Audit the post or comment by describing your train of thought regarding the level of quality you would assess your chosen post or comment Suggest how you would coach the author of audited post or comment to improve Tag (at least) three educators and challenge them to audit a post or comment Leave a comment with the link to your audit post on Langwitches Quality blog posts I created a few variations of checklists as guides for qu
Read more

Striving for Higher-Order Thinking and Depth of Knowledge

Image
A little over a year ago, I read Higher-order thinking is the exception rather than the norm for most classrooms on Scott McLeod's blog, Dangerously Irrelevant , and have been mulling it over, wondering if our school district is any different. Over the past year, our teachers periodically collect data with their teams on the types of questions/tasks they ask students. One teacher records teacher questions and the other records student responses on a shared Google Doc ; then teams sort through their own data, plotting teacher questions by Bloom's Revised Taxonomy , and student responses to those questions/tasks with Webb's Depth of Knowledge (DOK) . The 2012-2013 data showed we were not very different from other districts; therefore, our teams set their own goals for higher-order thinking and depth of knowledge. The data so far for the 2013-2014 school year shows questions asked of students are up and down the Bloom's ladder, equally distributed (with a little
Read more

Craft and Structure, Deeper Thinking, and Tech Integration

Image
What type of thinking does the Common Core ask of students when it comes to Craft and Structure? Analysis. Analyzing the author's craft and structure is a shift for students to do, and a shift for teachers to design tasks and questions that require analysis.  This is the critical thinking we want students to engage in. Shifts The big shift in this is the analysis. What does that look like at the elementary level? How do you teach Craft and Structure? There are many ways to teach craft and structure . Make sure students are analyzing the text , not just identifying the answers . Craft structure close read questions from tracywatanabe Every spring, our school district uses Title IIa funds to pay teachers to attend training. This year, our Spring Academy focuses on various aspects of Common Core... and teaching Craft and Structure is one of the sessions. I was charged with creating a training module for the K-6 sessions. Training Document:
Read more