Kahoot
Introduction
Kahoot is a browser-based system, still in beta, developed by a team lead by Johan Brand, Jamie Brooker, and Morten Versvik. It offers game-style quiz and survey construction with easy access from any smart device or computer. It is aimed at a K-12 system but can easily be adapted for use in the university setting. All accounts are free, which make it ideal for schools with lower budgets but also for flipping the classroom, making it easy for students to design their own quizzes. There is also no limitation on the number of people who join, or where they join from, making it ideal for use in connecting classrooms between schools or even to different countries, as they encourage with their Vision for a Global Classroom. Their blog updates regularly with new and innovative ways of using the platform, and they encourage feedback and the building of a community that pushes the functionality of the system further and further.
Functionality
The main features allow for the quick and easy creation of multiple-choice style quizzes, with options to make it more of a survey style (where percentages of answers from students are recorded and can be displayed) or standard quizzes (where there are distinct right answers and each student’s score is recorded). Within that format, it is quite useful and versatile. It could, for example, easily replace clickers or similar devices for quizzes and surveys in larger classrooms, as each student provides their own device or laptop.
Limitations
Pedagogical Value
The flexibility of the quizzes and the platform for teacher and student use opens it up for a wide variety of projects, including (just to name a few) assignments where students make quizzes for each other to test or review; or where students make quizzes to follow their own informational research presentations; or where the teacher can make use of out-of-class time to get students taking quizzes at set times through the day and thus lose less valuable class time to assessment.
Tutorial
To register, head to getkahoot.com (NOT to kahoot.it, the site for actually playing the quizzes). Click the "Sign up for free!" button in the top left. It will ask you for your role (teacher, student, etc.) and your affiliation, if any (the school or organization you will use Kahoot with), then to come up with a username and password. You will be asked to enter your email. Finishing this process will immediately sign you in.
Once you have successfully registered and signed in, you are given a choice of three kinds of Kahoots: quizzes, discussions, and surveys.
Quizzes are used when there is a right answer for respondents to choose. Quizzes can offer as many questions as you like, but each question can only have up to 4 potential answers. Surveys offer multiple answers for the participants to choose from, without one expected as the right answer. Surveys also have unlimited questions, but only 4 answers per question. Discussions are simple, one-question surveys that can be used to spark a larger conversation.
To create a new Kahoot, click on the type you want (under New K!), either a quiz, a discussion, or a survey. You will name the Kahoot, and this will take you to the question page.
For each question you will need to add the text of the question (in top text box, 95 characters allowed), decide the time allowed (in "Time limit" drop-down menu), and add 2 to 4 possible answers (in the bottom text boxes marked "Answer 1," "Answer 2," and so forth). You can also add an image or video for any question by either dragging and dropping a file into the central gray area or clicking the "Choose file" button in the middle. If you want to add more answers, click the grey plus sign next to the answer text boxes. If you want less, click
the grey minus sign.
For quizzes, there will also be a points drop-down menu and an incorrect/correct toggle below the answer text boxes. The
points drop-down menu allows you to choose whether this question will count for points credit to the quiz. The incorrect/correct toggles mark which answers will be taken as correct or incorrect. The toggles all begin at the red, incorrect setting, so you will need to click the toggle below the correct
answer or answers once. This will switch it to mark that answer or those answers as correct.
To add a new question, click the "+ Add Question" button on the bottom of the screen, and follow the instructions above to create the question. When you have entered all the questions you want, click "Save and Continue ->". Here you can indicate the language of the quiz, choose whether to make it public or private, and indicate the primary audience. You can also enter a description, add tags, and indicate the difficulty level. When you are done, click "Save and Continue ->" again, and your quiz is ready (though you can add a cover image if you like).
To play a Kahoot, click My Kahoots in the top left, and click the "Play->" button. Once you launch the Kahoot, a PIN will appear, and students can go to Kahoot.it to enter that code and play the Kahoot. Once all participants have signed in, click "Start."
In each type of Kahoot, the prompt gives the answers as multiple options that are coded to colors and shapes. Make sure to WARN PARTICIPANTS BEFOREHAND that they will only see the colors and shapes, so they are prepared to respond in time. At the end, students can rate the quiz.
There are also several video tutorials on the Kahoot website Frequently Asked Questions page.
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