Formative Assessments Made Easier

Plickers

By Julie Carson

Do you have a one-iPad classroom, a cellphone, or simply just an iPod touch? Well that is not a problem.  You can use any of these devices and do a quick formative assessment on your students in class.  All you have to do is go to plickers.com, sign up and create yourself an account.  Then create a class by assigning it a name, a grade level and subject area.  Once you do that it will show you 63 available cards.  When you start entering student names it will assign them a number.   Once you have assigned all students a number you go to the top of the screen and click on the print icon.

Then you will go to the top click on the word cards. 

You will be able to download a set of QR type cards and pass them out to your students.  I highly recommend printing them on card stock and laminating them.

Once you have created your class.  Go to library.  Click on the class that you want to create your formative assessment question for.

Then add the class or classes that you want to be able to answer the question.

Your question is now ready for your students to answer.

Make sure you download the app onto your device.

Click here for My Apps.

Click here for Android Google Play.

This is what your responses look like on an Apple product.

This is what your responses look like on an Android.

With this app you can scan the whole room at one time.  You do not have to do it one student at a time.  It picks up multiple students at once.

This is what your screen will look like as you are scanning the room.

Once you have collected your data you see that you can clear your responses if you would like.  You can also have them saved automatically to your plickers.com account to view later.

Also keep in mind that you do not have to create your questions on the computer.  You can type your questions and answers right on your device.  This can be done just by clicking on the + sign and then picking your class.  It is that simple.

I know that you will like it.  It is a great formative assessment tool.  It is wonderful to use as an exit ticket, impromptu polling tool and kids can keep the cards right there in their desk.  You do not have to pass them out each time.  Your students can even be the ones to come up with the questions… the skies the limit!