WEEK 10 - Plickers
“What the heck is a Plicker?”, you ask. Plickers are a wonderful free alternative to device-based Student Response Systems (like Socrative). The word “Plicker” is a concatenation of the words “paper” and “clicker”. Each student is given a paper “plicker” (you set these up on plickers.com) that contains a QR code that represents a unique identity for them, and by turning the plicker design in a different direction, they can provide a response to an “A, B, C, or D” type question. The teacher easily scans all the students with a smart phone or tablet, and quickly collects the responses.
Plickers are perfect for young students and for situations in which it is impractical for all students to have a device. Check out the video and articles for a deeper dive, and explore Plickers today!
I don't have a 3 Minute Teaching With Tech Tutorial for Plickers, but Brittany Goff has put together this great brief introduction to how to get started with Plickers:
Here are some articles about using Plickers, with ideas for using it in the classroom:
- 6 Easy Steps for Getting Started Using Free Plickers for Assessment by Nichloas Combs
- Clickers in the Classroom: An Active Learning Approach from EDUCAUSE
- Using Plickers in the Music Classroom from Kodaly Corner
- The “FAQ's” section from Plickers.com
Remember, AFTER YOU TRY Plickers, please be sure to comment below and tell us about your experience, so you'll have a chance at winning one of our giveaways at the end of the challenge! Tell us how you used it. Was it easy to use? What did your students have too say about it?
About the Challenge:
The Try-a-Tool-a-Week Challenge started March 1st. Every Sunday through the end of May we're publishing a new web page with a new, awesome free tool to try. Everyone who provides their name and email address (click here to open the Challenge introduction page and SIGN UP) will get an email providing the link to the page. The goal is just to have fun and learn about these powerful free web applications for teaching and learning, and along the way you get the opportunity to win some giveaways we'll award at the end of the challenge to randomly selected participants! To have a chance a winning, just participate and share some observations about the tools you each week!
