Have you ever asked a question in your classroom, meeting or lecture and received nothing but silence? It’s time to change that. Mentimeter is UTS’s new polling tool – available for all staff to use in July. Find out about all its features below and ask us how you’d like to be supported in using this tool in our short survey.
What’s a polling tool?
Polling tools can be used for a wide range of face-to-face or virtual activities to engage an audience and let them contribute to the session. In learning and teaching, polling tools such as Mentimeter are used to engage students through interactive learning and collaborative activities before, during or after a class. Audiences can answer in real time on their phones, tablets or laptops.
Why Mentimeter?
Mentimeter integrates with various pedagogical practices in an active learning space, meaning that you can use Mentimeter in your own way. You can design and present targeted quizzes (formative assessment only), surveys, polls and other activities to suit your students and learning environment.
Across both academic literature and in our very own UTS classrooms, Mentimeter provides a whole host of benefits for staff and students.
Staff can use Mentimeter to:
- Generate real-time results to monitor engagement and adjust a session’s pace accordingly
- Gauge a cohort’s understanding of the content through a non-assessed knowledge check
- Visualise real-time analysis of responses and compare the responses of different groups
- Increase your presence in the classroom or online learning space
- Scale up or down activities for large classes or small groups
- Engage with students using a wide range of question types, including but not limited to: Word clouds, Quizzes, and Surveys i.e. opinion polls and knowledge checks
For students, Mentimeter can:
- Break the silence barrier so that students feel safe to respond anonymously to questions
- Boost their confidence and sense of belonging by allowing students to easily engage in the learning activity without the anxiety of speaking up in front of their peers
- Provide comfort, with students accessing and completing the activity using their own personal devices, such as a laptop, phone or tablet
- Ensure students have time to respond to questions as well as ask their own questions
What can’t I use Mentimeter for?
As part of UTS’s commitment to protecting personal information, there are a few things you cannot use Mentimeter for, including:
- Assessment purposes
- Research purposes
- Collection of personal information
For more information, please read the Terms of Use and Privacy Notice, available on the UTS public website.
When can I start using it?
Mentimeter will be available for all staff to use in July. While you are waiting, the LX.lab is putting together a collection of resources to make sure both you and your students can get the most out of Mentimeter. Please complete this survey to help us understand how you currently use Mentimeter and how we can best support you with further resources and training.