[private] :: Blog :: WordWall audience response system

Today, Josh from WordWall delivered a presentation to the e-learning team of ADC on their audience response system (ARS) or electronic voting system (EVS).  It is slightly different from its competitors as PPVote or TurningPoint.  Of course it can do the straightforward MCQ questions on which students can vote with a clicker and deliver an outcome which can be used for discussion. But its main strength of WordWall is being more creative with the types of questions or better said quizzes. For example it will grasp the attention by solving as many equations as you can, order words in a sentence, brainstorm by texting words and indicate your opinion. This can be done individually or in a group. With their direct link to an online encyclopaedia the presentation can easily be livening up with additional images and or additional text. It strength is not only enhancing student attention during lectures as well as supporting deeper learning of the content by doing quizzes and games.

From the examples it becomes clear that WordWall has a strong background in secondary education and that HE is an area that they like to enter. The extended form of interaction you create with the WordWall ARS seems to be more suitable for small classes or tutorials than large groups. A second consideration is that WordWall is a separate software package and has almost no integration with PowerPoint with makes it harder to use during a normal lecture. Lastly because of all the functionality’s, it has a lot of settings and options to learn.

Nevertheless we could see opportunities using WordWall in HE, for example compared to its competitors, it seems slightly stronger or more attractive for surveys, opinions and brainstorms. The ARS seems to be suitable for tutorials. Or for example in the department of Education, were lectures use it as an example to enhance teaching with technology, and students take it on their traineeship as a teaching and learning tool.  

In all WordWall is a very nice example of educational technology, and worth following there development.

Kind regards,
Hendrik