In my opinion, engagement and long-term memory go hand-in-hand. As a student, I've always preferred when my teacher thought of a fun way to help me remember information. Whether we were singing a song, making a rhyme, or playing a game I always felt as though I had a better handle on the information after applying it to an activity.
As teachers, it is important to recognize when these kinds of experiences help our students to grasp content. Whether these strategies are used to activate knowledge, deliver instruction, or review, they inevitably help our students to remember their learning. For this project in particular, I created a review game for a third grade classroom that I would have enjoyed playing as a child. Although there is a wide selection of games that can be incorporated into a classroom setting, I ultimately decided on Kahoot! for its easy-to-make quizzes!
Kahoot! is a game-based learning platform that allows users to create fun, interactive quizzes. Free for all users, Kahoot! is the perfect way to incorporate assessments into a classroom. To use it, users must make an account and log on. There are several kinds of Kahoots—including quizzes, discussions, and surveys—so there are many ways that a teacher would be able to use this in the classroom. For my project in particular, however, I chose to create a Kahoot! Quiz.
Creating a quiz using Kahoot! is incredibly simple! Once a user chooses the type of Kahoot they'd like to make, the Kahoot Creator appears. This recently renovated feature makes it easy for users to input their information and create a quiz quickly and easily. After entering the descriptive information, users move on to creating questions.
Each question is customizable, which is a feature that is extremely helpful when teaching a variety of topics. The user enters the question and sets a time limit for the question length. Additionally, the user will also input anywhere from two to four potential answers to choose from. To indicate the correct answer for grading, the user simply clicks on the "checkmark" that is next to the correct answer and it will turn green. A really interesting feature is that users can choose more than one correct answer. I chose to do this in one of my questions to gain an understanding of how students had interpreted the question or retained information based on which answer they chose.
Although I did not use it for this particular project, a feature that I really enjoy about Kahoot! is that it allows you to attach some form of media to your questions. Whether it is a picture or a video, students have the opportunity to interpret that media and answer questions about it. I also enjoy the fact that the user can choose whether or not they will award points throughout the quiz. Because there are a few drawbacks to using Kahoot!, including an encouragement of competitiveness, removing the points allotted for every question might eliminate that issue from the classroom all together. In addition to the competitiveness, answers are displayed using symbols and students may become confused navigating their technological devices and choose the wrong answer.
Overall, however, the game is relatively easy to play and to teach to young students. Children of all ages have used Kahoot! and the only requirement is their access to a device to play. Once all questions have been finalized, the user can publish their Kahoot! and begin quizzing! As an added bonus, the data collected throughout the quiz can be exported and analyzed for data collection on students.
For my project, I chose to create a Kahoot! that would ultimately be used in conjunction with lessons that I am planning for my Literacy Infused Unit. For this unit, I am focusing on the Social Studies Essential Standard 3.G.1, which states that students should be able to, "Understand the earth's patterns by using the 5 themes of geography: (location, place, human/environment interaction, movement and regions). More specifically, however, the lessons will focus on standard 3.G.1.1, which states that students will, "Find absolute and relative locations of places within the local community and region."
To display my quiz I created a video that is a detailed version of me playing my review game. Kahoot! gives users a unique opportunity to preview their game before it is published or used with actual students. The video shows two screens—the questions that the students would see projected on the board and the answer options that would be found on the device that they have chosen to play the game with. As the video progresses, you can see the questions and their answers. Each answer has a corresponding symbol, which displays in order on a student's device. Their responsibility is to press on the symbol that represents their answer choice. In games that have indicated that points are being earned, the student that answers the question correctly the fastest is the student that gains the most points. It also recognizes students that have "streaks" and have answered multiple questions correctly in a row. Click here for an enlarged version of the video!
For my project, I chose to create a Kahoot! that would ultimately be used in conjunction with lessons that I am planning for my Literacy Infused Unit. For this unit, I am focusing on the Social Studies Essential Standard 3.G.1, which states that students should be able to, "Understand the earth's patterns by using the 5 themes of geography: (location, place, human/environment interaction, movement and regions). More specifically, however, the lessons will focus on standard 3.G.1.1, which states that students will, "Find absolute and relative locations of places within the local community and region."
I followed the steps to setup an account for Kahoot! and created a 10-question quiz to review the content after it has already been taught. The questions directly address the topics covered in the lesson and some of the expected learner outcomes that the students should be able to demonstrate upon completion of the lessons.
To display my quiz I created a video that is a detailed version of me playing my review game. Kahoot! gives users a unique opportunity to preview their game before it is published or used with actual students. The video shows two screens—the questions that the students would see projected on the board and the answer options that would be found on the device that they have chosen to play the game with. As the video progresses, you can see the questions and their answers. Each answer has a corresponding symbol, which displays in order on a student's device. Their responsibility is to press on the symbol that represents their answer choice. In games that have indicated that points are being earned, the student that answers the question correctly the fastest is the student that gains the most points. It also recognizes students that have "streaks" and have answered multiple questions correctly in a row. Click here for an enlarged version of the video!
Overall, this was such a rewarding project! Although I have engaged in several Kahoot! quizzes throughout my time at High Point University, I never have had the opportunity to create one myself. This was a wonderful learning experience and I can see how relevant this particular review game could be in my classroom. Students absolutely love games and I can see students wanting to participate in these kinds of games in my future classroom. I look forward to researching other review game tools that allow me to formatively assess or engage my students in their learning!
