There are only a hand few of multiple choice Quiz Creating apps in Google Play for tech savvy teachers, and Quizmo is the newest. Quizmo has only been out for two months, but already has 1000+ downloads in Google Play thanks to its ability to easily incorporate personal photos into your quiz via your camera or image gallery. Quizmo also lightens you up on having to type all possible answers for your questions as the answers are taken randomly from other questions in the quiz (this saves HELLA time). If you are like me, you use the text to speech option and damn near never have to type a thing except minor mistakes made by Google Voice.
The ability to create multiple choice quizzes and share them via smartphones is not new, but in the past, it has been very difficult to connect photos to your multiple choice questions without risking the coding when sending them via email to your students. When compared to similar apps like Quiz 'n Poll, Quizmo definitely looks better, but is not as simple to share. Sending your students a quiz on their phones using Quiz 'n Poll is much simpler and doesn't require you to memorize any codes and enter them. Though the concept seems easy, it is really annoying when having to deliver your quiz in class. For more on Quizmo, check out my review in Google Play and see if it's right for you.
If you're like me, and I'm almost certain you are, you have often stopped and gawked at posters or flyers with that little black and white textiled square in the corner and wondered what the heck it is. Eventually, you rationalize it to be some kind of mutant barcode, and in fact you're right! QR Codes, or Quick Response Codes, seem to be everywhere and on everything today. So what exactly is a QR Code and why the heck is everyone putting them on everything? Well, compared to a regular barcode you see on merchandise in retail stores, QR Codes posess faster readability and hold more storage space. What does that mean? Well, in Layman's terms, the barcode at your retail store when read by a scanner only informs the reader of the price and name of the object being scanned while a QR Code when scanned holds a link to a website, photo or video. QR Codes were originally designed for businesses in the form of marketing, hence why you see them all over soda cans, food labels, and all kinds of merchandise.
The next question is,"How can I read them?" QR Codes can be read by smartphones and tablets. There are a lot of free QR Code reading and creating apps available for your mobile device and they are usally all free. Some of the more popular include, Google Goggles, ScanLife, QR Droid and Kaywa Reader (a coworker of mine, Chris Johnson hipped me to Kaywa Reader). Simply download the free app via your Google Play Store app on your Droid phone or from your Apple Store on your iphone, and using your phone camera, begin scanning them. As you will find, the codes link you to websites, photos, or videos instantly.
So how do these things work in an ESL classroom? Well, many of the same QR Readers available in your app store also allow you to generate you own QR Codes and print them. This gives you the power to connect students to photos, vidoes, or websites relevant to ESL. One teacher even had a great idea of forming a scavanger hunt in her ESL institution by placing cut out codes around the hallways that contained instrutions on how to complete the hunt. Students used their smartphones to deocode the QRs and continue on the ESL scavage. I personally print and paste cut outs of QR Codes via my Quiz and Poll app and let students scan them with their phones to take ESL quizzes or join in class polls.
Students really enjoy scanning QR Codes with their smartphones because it promotes m-Learning. The results are fun, spontaneous, portable, and personal. Students are engaged more in learning because they feel a sense of responsibilty being allowed to use their smartphones in class and even more so used as an educational tool. At the end of each of my classes, I actually teach my students how to generate their own QR Codes of photos of themselves and let them hang them on my wall so they can feel free at anytime to check themselves or someone else out.
If you want to know more about QR Codes in your classroom check out the little video below!
So it's been over a month since I've introduced Quiz and Poll into my ESL class curriculum and I am here to say that I am satified! My students are now really engaged in learning and are very happy! I have noticed three things. One, I was suprised to find that my students are up at all types of night, just like me. The leaderboard is a great option because, if I check it around two or three am, I can see that four out of six of my students have already taken the quiz. I usually check my leaderboards around 10 or 11 pm, and then again around two or three am. What I have found that at least half of my students are completing thier quizzes between 12 and two am. This means that students are willing to actively learn in the middlle of the night. Speaking of the leaderboard, I have also taken advantage of it's competitiveness by giving those individuals with the highest scores all week two bonus percentage points towards their final class grade. Finally, I find that my students are spreading the word of Quiz and Poll amongst their friends in school, as I have had numerous students outside of my class ask me if I could 'show' their teachers how to use Quiz and Poll.
I have had a few problems with this app however. For one, when I am creating questions in the spreadsheet, sometimes the screen freezes up in the middle of my typing. It usually takes a minute before I am able to type again until the screen freezes back up. This can be very annonying and turn a ten minute quiz prep into a fifteen minute one. I think that it would be nice if there were an option to batch list a group of emailed students. I tried to copy and paste but was only able to keep the first student I highlight. Finally, I have more experience with the quiz aspect of this app but have only two or three attempts at the poll side of it. My attempts to use it in class has brought a few things to my attention. For one, the projected image and my students phone image are not always coordinated and at least two out of 12 slides are forced ahead before my students can answer them. The graphs are good, but a little basic looking and are often confusing when we are reviewing the answers in class. The students do however like to see their names under their elevated chart scores after we finish!
I will stay commited to this app since it is my first real experience with m-Learning, But I will also be looking out for something better if the issues above continue into the end of this session.
As most of you are aware, I have been on a m-Learning roll over the past few months. I have fallen in love with technology in the classroom again after deciding to explore educational apps on my smart phone and stumbling across Quiz and Poll. I can not tell you enough of how Awesome this app really is. There are two sides to this app. The first side is the quiz option which is generally used as an after the classroom expereinece. I assign my students a quick ten question quiz created in a Google Drive spreadsheet and share it with them via thier email address. Once the students recieves the email on thier smart phone or tablet, they can answer the quiz as many times as they wish and recieve a higher score the faster they complete it. My first attempt was using Comparisons in English in my ESL class, about a month ago and the students loved it. The idea of getting a quiz on thier phone was unheard of to most of them. And to my suprise, I found that students who were paying the least attention IN class were the first to answer the quiz. The app also allowed me a way to track their learning as the leader scoreboard revealed to me who awnsered correctly and actually understood each question. The competitive edge of the whole thing made m-Learning even more fun for them.
Secondly, I tried the Poll app and presented an in class quiz where the students responded to the projected questions via thier smart phones, tablets, or laptops in class. They had so much fun watching their scores go up and down in class as they answered each question. There were a few glitches at first, but the students didn't care, and based on their results, they totally understood the concept of Comparisons in English and had fun.
The best part of the whole app is that I created a quiz that was tailored to what I taught them in class. It took me literally no time to create the quizzes and even less time to grade them. This is what m-Learning is really all about; personal, portable, exciting and spontaneous.
