Poll Everywhere

Multiple choice is by far the most popular and common type of activity used.This question type allows instructors to create multiple-choice questions with up to five answer options. Instructors can select as many 'correct' answers as needed or leave the activity open-ended.

Best practices with multiple choice activities

• Use this question type to encourage active learning and engagement by providing students with a variety of answer options.
• Assess student understanding of specific concepts or to gauge student opinions on different topics.
  • Encourage students to explain their reasoning behind their choices, and use this feedback to guide future class discussions or assignments.
• Include both correct and incorrect answer options to promote critical thinking and encourage class discussions.
• Consider using this question type to create pre-class quizzes or post-class assessments.
  • This activity could count as attendance for a class session.
• Use this question type to encourage peer instruction and collaboration by having students discuss their answers with their classmates before submitting their final responses.
• Prompt discussion on controversial or complex topics by providing answer options that represent different perspectives.

Learn more about multiple choice activities

This question type allows instructors to create a question and have students respond with a single word or phrase, which will be displayed in a word cloud. Word clouds are a fun way to visualize responses. The visualization will build and shift in real time as audience responses are repeated. The most frequent responses will appear larger in the middle of the word cloud.

Best practices with word cloud activities

• Use this question type to assess student understanding of specific concepts or to prompt class discussions.
• Encourage students to provide relevant and meaningful responses, and use this feedback to guide class discussions or assignments.
• Use this question type to create a visual representation of student opinions or perspectives on different topics.

Learn more about the word cloud activity

The Q&A (question and answer) question type allows students to submit their own questions in real-time, which the instructor can then address in class. Participants enter their responses, ideas, questions, etc. into the text box. They can also upvote or downvote responses by other participants which appear on their response page view.

This is the only activity that enables the audience to see other participants' responses on the response page. Everyone will be able to upvote or a downvote all of the responses submitted. Upvotes and downvotes do not count against the response limit.

Best practices with Q&A activities

• Use this question type to promote student engagement and encourage students to take an active role in their learning.
• Use this question type to create a safe space for students to ask questions and share their perspectives on other submissions and topics.
• Use this question type to provide students with immediate feedback and answers to their questions during class.
• Promote student ownership of their learning by having them submit their own questions to be answered in class.

Learn more about Q&A activities

The clickable image (hotspot) question type allows instructors to create questions with an image and have students respond by clicking on a specific area of the image. These activities allow participants to drop pins on an image to respond. Presenters can upload an image or select one of the provided example images.

Best practices with clickable image activities

• Use this question type to create a visual representation of student opinions or perspectives on different topics.
• Prompt students to analyze and evaluate images or graphs related to course material.
• Use this question type to encourage students to identify patterns or trends in data presented in class.
• Use this question type to promote visual literacy and critical thinking skills.

Learn more about clickable image activities

Surveys allow you to ask your participants multiple questions at once. Everyone can answer the questions privately at their own pace. They're great for quizzes, pre- and post-training assessments, questionnaires, etc. Surveys can be activated and displayed on your dedicated pollev.com response page, shared with a dedicated link, or even used during a presentation.

Are there differences between this activity and Microsoft Forms?

Yes. In most cases, you'd want to use Microsoft Forms to submit and distribute surveys over Poll Everywhere. Microsoft Forms allows you to create more complex survey designs with conditional branching based on responses. This can be useful if you want to create a survey that adapts to the specific needs or preferences of individual participants. 

Learn more about surveys in Poll Everywhere

The open-ended activity type allows the audience to respond to the question with a written answer. Just like multiple choice activities, open-ended questions can receive responses via SMS text message, web, and the mobile app. Responses can be displayed four different ways: Word cloud, text wall, cluster, and spotlight. 

Best practices with open-ended activities

• Use this question type to prompt students to apply course concepts to real-world scenarios or current events.
• Use this question type to gather student feedback on the course content, teaching methods, or assignments.
• Encourage students to submit open-ended questions in addition to their responses to promote further class discussion.

Learn more about open-ended activities

Competitions are an activity type that enables instructors to string together multiple activities and set certain limitations to promote competition. These limitations come in the form of settings such as: Allowing answer changes, enabling time limits per question, and more. Gamification and competitions are useful not only in the educational sphere but in the business world as well. There’s nothing quite like a friendly competition to get people involved and engaged. 

Learn more about competitions