Instructional Uses of Clickers or Personal Response Systems

We can use clickers in many different ways in our classroom. Here’s a few. We can ask the students:

Background questions such as “Have you ever explained to someone the reasons you wanted to buy something? 1-Yes 2- No”

Learning style questions such as “How long did it take you to do the essay? 1-30 2- 40 3- 50 4- 60 + minutes”
Or “Which part of the essay was the hardest to do 1-Identify a topic 2- Pre-Write 3- Write topic sentences 4- Provide vivid details”

Low thinking level review questions such as “An effect essay 1-shows similarities between two things 2- tells a story of a change 3- gives details about a process 4- provides the results of something ”

Higher-level thinking questions such as “Which body paragraph in this essay has the most concrete examples? 1- first 2-second 3-third?”

The more questions we can ask at the higher-levels of thinking, the more we can engage not only the  students’ attention but their in-depth thinking.