Interaction through mobile phone polling during synchronous teaching sessions Helen Wozniak: FlindersNT, School of Medicine Cyndie McCarley: Flinders, School of Medicine/School of Education

Context: Flinders Northern Territory Medical Program (NTMP) Year 1-2 Pre-clinical years at Charles Darwin University campus since 2011 –Local teaching- small group PBL, anatomy clinical skills –Video-conference lectures from Adelaide Year 3-4 clinical years 5 sites across NT since 1998 –Clinical teaching at all 5 sites, small groups –Video conference sessions across all NT sites Approx 120 students (25-30 per year) Indigenous entry stream (total 16 students currently) 2 of 13

Why use polling? aka Audience Response System Power of technology to create a bridge between people separated by time and place Untapped potential of mobile/ tablet devices Student expectations of interaction (already using Facebook messaging back channel which academic staff cannot access) (Horizon Report: Johnson et al 2012, 2013) 3 of 13

Are all audience response systems the same? NO We needed –Web or mobile phone polling –Ability to link students separated by distance from each other and lecturers –No special software requirements ANSWER 4 of 13

How do you set it up? Web interface to create questions Question Types: MCQ or free text Can insert poll embedded in ppt slide and run poll via powerpoint or from a unique simple web url 5 of 13

How do students vote? Students vote via web address (free) or sending text code (txt charge) to mobile number (twitter also an option) 6 of 13

How do you see results? Several options –Real time within ppt presentation (you can see the votes come in or choose to wait until everyone has voted then show results) –Via webpage –After session: download results table as excel spreadsheet Next some examples 7 of 13

Example 1 Year 1 Video conference lecture Intro to e-learning for medical course held in Darwin Darwin students and Adelaide students (3 votes each) 8 of 13

Example 2 Year 1 local session- intro to group work Start of session - Opinion about PBL (MCQ style) End of session – Student opinions gathered about group learning via free text responses Page allows you to scroll down through responses 9 of 13

Example 3 Year 3 session at 4 different sites (1,500km apart) responding to question at same time Enabled tutors in each site to determine student progress with assessment and tailor session to student needs 10 of 13

Neat features You can change the poll on the fly and the updates appear immediately in your powerpoint Subscription provides you with a unique and easy url to use for voting Works well on mobile devices Accepts free text comments (not limited to MCQ’s) 11 of 13

Drawbacks License cost if you want > 40 students to vote or >1 presenter on the account Limited ability to customise look and feel- more options from Sept 2013 Bringing in a new interface Sept 2013 which will require MSPowerpoint plug in (may be drawback as computers will need plug in) 12 of 13

Questions / Comments? Try it now Go to url: pollev.com/ntmp (no www in web address) 13 of 13 Thanks for watching!

Poll 14 of 13