Small Steps toward Technology Integration - Clickers

With the addition of eInstruction Clickers in our building after the first of the year, several of our teachers are using them as a motivational way to prepare students for the state tests, with some interesting results for both teacher and student. We have learned several different uses for said Clickers depending on the goal that you are wanting to accomplish. But, this has not come without some lessons in management along the way.


One problem that has come up when using them is, what to do while waiting for everyone to send in their response. With students working at varying paces, some activities would take forever, thus creating some downtime in which participants could get off task. To help this, some have resorted to using a "student led" option in which students work at their own pace and send in their answers as they complete each problem. This has been a favorite because each student is provided with immediate feedback of their own work. However, this is not where the Clicker software's capabilites should end.


Our classroom has found that the Clickers provide a good way to start a discussion during a novel. Giving students several choices to a debatable situation and then letting them explain their position has led to more than one higher level discussion during our read alouds. The question, "Based on events up to this point in the story, which of the gods do you think is Percy's father?" from early in Rick Riordan's, The Lightning Thief, led to some heated debating and some students to read further into some Greek Mythology.

The use of Clickers to come up with solutions to problems that come up during our class meetings is a great way to get a student's true feelings about a situation. Being able to enter students' solutions to a problem or concern into the CPS software and then, as a class, vote instantly on one of their options has given each student their own "voice" back instead of the persuasion of a friend's vote.

With the ability to add photos and pictures into a Clicker lesson, provides learners with some other higher level thinking skills and an opportunity to explain their reasoning.



There have been a couple of positive things that I have seen as a result of having the Clicker sets in our building. Of course, the students are very motivated to answer questions and like having the opportunity to get that immediate feedback (unless someone is taking an extra long time answering). Secondly, it has persuaded some technology reluctant teachers to venture into something new and engaging. Teachers are now starting to use some of the available resources to assess a lesson or even to gather information from students. While I could see some teachers getting into a "rut" and not using them in a meaningful way, but at least for starters, the willingness to try something that wasn't in last year's lesson plans is a big step forward. Baby steps, baby steps.