Friday, September 25, 2015

Kahoot! to raise engagement!

If you are looking to change things up in your classroom and try a new tool, I'd recommend giving Kahoot! a try. Kahoot! is an engagement dream, a way to focus your students, blend game structure, share thoughts and formally assess them. Kahoot! is an audience response system that works on any device that has internet, as it uses a web browser, not just the Kahoot! app. Laptop, iPhone, iPad, Chromebook, desktop, etc. Kahoot! allows the teacher to give a quiz, a discussion, or a survey. The results can be downloaded and saved. The results give question by questions breakdown, as well as individual results, making tracking and documentation a snap!  
After signing up for a free account, create a Kahoot! quiz. You will add questions and then when you launch the quiz, you will instruct the students to go to kahoot.it and enter the game pin. This connects their device with the quiz you are showing on the smartboard. On their device, they see the four options, which are shapes. They select the shape that corresponds with the correct answer. You can adjust the time limit, the audience, the difficulty and also share it with others. 
Application for Education: Kahoot! is just a tool and it's not about the tool. It's about the learning. So how does Kahoot! help learning? Use Kahoot! to do a short, fun quiz to see where your students are at. The game-based feel to it makes it much more engaging than a centeo quiz or scantron. Engagement can not be underestimated when it comes to improving the learning.  Learning rises as engagement rises. It's a fundamental fact of education and of life.  I'm convinced that if the student knows a Kahoot! is waiting for them, they will be more eager to learn the content and get prepared. They will be eager to see their game-based score as they navigate the Kahoot! quiz. 


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