Kahoot – a fun assessment tool!

by

http://blog.getkahoot.com/post/86503768922/download-kahoot-goodies-ahead-of-your-summer-training#Logos

Every week many Norwegian classrooms turn into a game show, where kids can barely sit on their chairs eager to show their knowledge and beat their classmates. And it’s easy to use, too!

Game-based learning has improved is standings over the last years, showing even unmotivated pupils that learning can be fun. There are lots of different games available, but I’m pretty confident I have found my personal favorite, Kahoot!

As a teacher, I have to prepare several multiple choice questions before the lesson, or choose among the almost 250 000 open-to-public-quizzes made by previous quizmasters. I connect my computer to the projector, and the participants can join through the smart phones they probably already got in their pockets, or connecting through a computer. At the website kahoot.it all that is needed is the four-digit pin already shown from the master computer, so the participants can enter their names. No downloads or apps needed, you are good to go almost immediately (allow some time for some confusion the first time you try, the next it will run smooth).

As the questions pop up on the screen, the participants choose their preferred alternative. After every question, the top five scores are shown; the pupils are always excited to see their name making it towards the top of the scoreboard! At the end of the quiz you can download the full results to see all given answers, a valuable help to plan the next lesson to get rid of some misconceptions.

I’ve even challenged my kids to prepare a Kahoot for the next lesson as compulsory homework (well, without mentioning the word homework of course…), a great way to gain further understandings of the teaching material, not to mention how much it’s simplifying my lesson planning.

After showing the game to the rest of the teachers in my school at a staff meeting, the software has been really popular among the pupils. In my school, the classroom walls facing the corridor are mostly windows, sometimes a struggle to keep attention in the classroom, recently also a blessing when I see kids from other classes gather outside the windows watching the quiz, discussing the answer of what might be a math or science question at the board. I even had kids asking if they could join the lesson to try to win.

The quizzes could be made to suit almost every subject, and it is also possible to add pictures or even videos to add further information to the text.

I would really recommend trying out Kahoot to bring some extra spice in the classroom! Just remember to wait until the last 10-15 minutes of the lesson to do the quiz, as it tends to be difficult to bring the kids back to reading textbooks…

Article written by: Magnus Carlenas, Scientix Deputy Ambassador

Tags: ,

One Response to “Kahoot – a fun assessment tool!”

  1. Haylee Fernetti says:

    Hi Magnus,
    Thank you for this great post on Kahoot! I am currently a pre-service teacher and I have just recently experienced Kahoot for the first time. I absolutely loved it. I definitely can see how it can increase student engagement. When I attempted to create my own Kahoot, I also found that it was super straight-forward and not very time consuming. However, I never thought to have the students create their own Kahoot, but I think that is a great way for students to study! Kahoot is definitely a technology I would love to use in my future classroom. Thank you for all the great ideas on how to use Kahoot in the classroom, I look forward to reading more of your posts on technology in the classroom.

Leave a Reply

XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>