Clickers in the ECC Classroom

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Clickers in the ECC Classroom
David Vakil dvakil_at_elcamino.edu
310-660-3134 December 6, 2007
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Highlights

• What are clickers? What can you do with them?
• Who can use them?
• When are they available to you and your students?
• Why should you use clickers?
• Where do you get the equipment?
• How do you get started?
• Clickers enable you to do student-centered
  learning. Lets start with a student-centered
  activity, rather than with me lecturing. This is
  what clickers are about.

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• Some examples of how clickers can be usedin
  classes

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By show of handsWho believesNot enough
students answer questions that I ask during
class.
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Not enough students answer questions that I ask
during class.

1. True
2. False

See how much the vote participation increases
with clickers?
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Which one of these people directly affects your
life most?

1. George W. Bush
2. Arnold Schwarzenegger
3. State assemblyperson or senator
4. Mayor of your town
5. Tom Fallo
6. Gloria Miranda

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PRE-TEST POST-TEST STUDENTS TO ASSESS LEARNING
A light year is a measure of

1. Time
2. Distance

Dave Timed question!
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Checking current understanding during class

• A miniature astronomy lecture
• The universe is 13.7 billion years old.
• A light year is ____________________________.

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IN-CLASS (next class?) FACT CHECK A light year
is a measure of

1. Time
2. Distance

As seen here, you can also visually compare to
questions, or, in this case, pre- and
post-lecture answers. Purple previous. Blue
current.
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Think-Pair-Share

• Ask the question
• If results are between 50-90 correct, consult
  with your neighbor and vote again
• Usually results improve noticeably
• Students understand and remember concept better
• Takes only 1 minute or less

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MORE CONCEPTUAL UNDERSTANDINGIt is possible for
astronomers to detect an object 15 billion light
years away from Earth.

1. True
2. False

Dave Think-pair-share?
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What are clickers?

• Clickers send signals using Radio frequency (RF)
  light to a computer. Computer processes the data.
• Radio light doesnt require line-of-sight
• Receiver is small and portable.
• NEW clickers have a screen for direct feedback to
  student allows for clicker-tests! (They use AAA
  batteries.)

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What can you do with clickers?

• Taking attendance (automatically calculated if
  any question is asked)
• Classroom demographics who are your students?
• Ice-breakers
• Gathering feedback about class or getting
  opinions
• like/dislike activity, useful/useless, etc.
• Discussion starters
• Quick assessment of recently covered material
• Ask about facts or conceptual understanding.
• No question is too easy to ask students. Youll
  be amazed.
• Build their confidence or shake yours!
• Pre- and post-instruction questions. (Did they
  learn?)

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Uses, continued

• Data gathering very useful for SLOs,
  Accreditation
• Cooperative learning Think-pair-share
• Quizzes
• End of class summary
• Beginning of class review
• Determine if students did reading/homework
• Full-length tests
• Ranking choices
• On-the-fly questions to suit whatever comes to
  mind during class.
• Fastest responses
• Team questions/answers

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Information gathered by clicker

• Which clickers responded to the question
• What answer each clicker gave to each question
• If multiple answers given, order is saved
• Can be used for entering multi-digit
  numbers/decimals or ranking.
• How long it took each clicker (student) to answer
• When a question is re-polled, both answers sets
  are saved
• Results are easily exported to Excel

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Who can use clickers?

• Anybody with basic knowledge of computers
• Knowledge of PowerPoint helpful, but not
  required.
• New version of TurningPoint software (called
  TurningPoint Anywhere) can be used outside of
  PowerPoint. Also available for Macs.
• Data stored.
• Screenshots saved.

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When are they available to you and your students?

• Right now!
• If youre interested in using them in your
  classes or even just trying them out, start by
  reading the web page I created.
  http//www.elcamino.edu/faculty/dvakil/clickers.ht
  m
• Theres also a link on my faculty page.
• Hoping to purchase classroom sets of clickers
• Having students buy the clickers doesnt work
  very well for teacher or student. Also, cant
  sell back.

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Why you should use clickersEffects clickers
have had on my classes

• Physics 2A summer 2007/2006 vs. summer 2003
• Success 29/35 83 31/44 70 28/49 57
• Retention 31/35 89 42/44 95 30/49 61
• Success (percent who passed) in Astr 25 went up
  by 9.
• Success in Astronomy 20 increased 15
• Data were compiled from my spreadsheets.
  Therefore numbers arent exact.
• I estimate attendance is 60 w/o clickers 75
  with, Note clicker participation counts little
  towards grades.
• Research at 4-year schools shows attendance at
  85.
• Similar research shows students read the text
  more, are more interested in the course, and have
  a more positive attitude towards the course.
• When I dont use clickers during class, I get
  complaints! Students like clickers and learn from
  using them.

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More reasons why you should consider using
clickers in your classes

• Interactive
• Student-centered, minds-on
• Just-in-time teaching is available with pre-tests
  (clicker? Do you know?)
• Immediate feedback to you AND your students
• Fun
• Gets everyone actively (not passively) involved
  (anonymous)
• Especially shy students!
• Early and frequent assessment
• Diagnose and fix bad lectures/activities
• Catch poor students quickly, start
  troubleshooting early
• Scantron forms are obsolete. Clickers provide
  more data, helps you write better tests. Also
  faster grading.
• Attendance increases (in my class, research)
• Retention increases (in my class, research)
• Success increases (in my class, according to lots
  of research)
• We can use clickers to gather data for SLOs, as
  needed

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Clicker capabilities

• The following slides show some other things you
  can do with clickers.

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MULTI-ANSWER Which of the following are NOT
types of electromagnetic radiation? Select all
that apply.

1. Gamma rays
2. X-rays
3. Infrared
4. Ultraviolet
5. Ultrasound
6. Sound waves
7. Microwaves
8. Radio waves

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Improve in-class demonstrations

• Youll see this process at work in the next 2
  slides.
• Explain the demo set-up
• Have students predict the outcome
• Do the demonstration
• Specifically ask students Was your prediction
  correct? (De-isolate, recognize intuition can be
  wrong)

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I will drop a pen and a crumpled piece of paper.
Which will hit the ground first?

1. The pen will hit the ground first.
2. They will hit the ground at the same time.
3. The paper will hit the ground first.

I will now perform the demonstration
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Quizzes Tests

• These clickers can handle tests quizzes
• The software is different, not as user-friendly
  (yet)
• Requires some student training of the clickers,
  so I wont demonstrate that now.

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Where do you get the equipment?

• Clickers cost 45 Shipping Handling. Need
  classroom sets. Class set of 45 costs 2500
  set of 40 2200.
• Receiver needed to get the signals from the
  clickers. You get this from me.
• Natural Science received I-grant from ECC
  Foundation to purchase receivers for entire
  division. We decided to share.
• I have 31 receivers to distribute.
• Have your dean ask me to send __(how many?)___
  receivers to your division office. Accounting
• Software to interpret the signals.
• Download from web site www.turningtechnologies.co
  m.

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How do I get started?

• Get the receiver (and purchase a clicker)
• Staff Development will have a set to use in their
  training room, once I train LaTonya Motley.
• Train yourself for the software
• Documents I created (see web page or ask me)
• Self-exploration
• Web-based demonstrations
• Read the manual
• Staff Development classes coming soon
• Start small in your classes

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On a scale of 1-10, how useful was this
presentation? 1bad, 10good

1. 1
2. 2
3. 3
4. 4
5. 5
6. 6
7. 7
8. 8
9. 9
10. 10

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CONCLUSION

• There are a LOT of things you can do with
  clickers in your class
• Method of student-centered learning
• They dramatically increase learning
• Particularly well-suited for lecture classes
• Now available campus-wide
• Questions? Comments?