Socrative and My Students Have a Love/Hate Relationship

I adore this app, and all that it stands for.  Instant feedback.  Instant color-coded data.  Extremely user-friendly interface for the teacher.

My students, however, are not so quick to rave about Socrative these days.

When Socrative was *only* about data to inform instruction, and was *not* about accountability that goes in the grade book, students raved about this app.  Now that their performance on my weekly 3-question Socrative warm-up quiz counts for a grade, some students have changed their tune.

“I accidentally hit the wrong answer choice!”

“I wish this app let me go back to revisit a question!”

These are the cries of my students… and I think they have some valid points.  Am I asking too much, or would my students’ suggestions make Socrative a better tool for the masses?  Am I misusing Socrative?  Is this tool *only* meant for formative assessment that “doesn’t count”?

Next week, my warm-ups quiz will be given through our online gradebook program, called Skyward.  I can still present a quick online multiple-choice quiz to my students to take on their iPads, but they can scan their answers and press “submit” when finished.  As a matter of fact, students’ grades will be automatically entered into my electronic grade book (though this is not my priority in using an online assessment tool – I want what’s best for my students).  I hope this will allay some of my students’ frustration.  Now we’ll see whether the issue is “I hit the wrong choice by mistake” or “I should have studied”!

Socrative Big Wigs, if you are reading this, can you let me know if there are ways to revisit questions, or undo the dreaded I-hit-the-wrong-answer-choice complaint?  (After all, it is easy to do this on a very touch-sensitive iPad screen.)  Thank you, and I know my students would thank you as well.  😉

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11 Responses to Socrative and My Students Have a Love/Hate Relationship

  1. Ben says:

    Hi Cathy,

    Thanks for sharing the dilemma you’re now facing with assigning grades. Our central focus has always been on quality formative assessment functionality, and we recognize the growth in grade collecting quizzes.

    You may like to know we have built in a multi-second time delay from when a question is presented to when a student can answer. This is meant to alleviate students selecting answers inadvertently.

    Also, you can turn off instant feedback under the Advanced Quiz Options. We have found this reduces student claims that they hit the wrong button. Nothing causes a chorus of “I accidentally hit the wrong answer choice!” like instant feedback that the answer is incorrect.

    Most importantly, we’d love to hear what you and your students recommend for improving Socrative. Our goal is to provide you and your students the best learning experience possible. Please don’t hesitate to email me.

    Best,
    Ben

    Ben Berte
    Co-founder Socrative
    ben@socrative.com

  2. Cathy Yenca says:

    Thanks for your quick feedback! I shared what you said with my students today. They were quite impressed to hear from you, and felt empowered that their feedback was heard!

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  4. Craig Young says:

    Hi Cathy
    I am just becoming aware of socrative and its use in the classroom. However students do not have iPads and I will just be relying on their own mobile phones. Have you had any experience of this.

    Also was thinking about your dilemma about students pressing the wrong answer. I agree with Ben about turning off the instant feedback, but you could also ask an open question at the end to see if students wanted to change any of their previous responses.

    I would love to get more technology in the maths classroom and will be following your blogs with interest.

    Thanks

    Craig

    • Cathy Yenca says:

      Thanks for stopping by!

      I haven’t experienced using phones in the classroom, but I often demo my lessons using my iPad in teacher mode and my phone in student mode, just to test things out. Haven’t done this with Socrative specifically, but I have used my phone to test Nearpod – works great!

      I did turn off the feedback on Socrative once, and my students begged me to turn it back on next time! I think we have overcome the initial Socrative growing pains, and I look forward to a possible update in the future that may address our concerns.

      Would love to hear how using phones works out in your classroom!

      • John says:

        I’ve used Socrative with phones a few times. It worked pretty well. I don’t have Ipads and such in my classroom, so the BYOD approach is what I have to use. They have a feature that allows students to hand their phone off to another student; this allows everyone to have a shot.

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  7. Geoffrey T. says:

    Check out the new Socrative 2.0! They now have an overall “submit” for the entire quiz. You can go back and answer student paced quizes in any order and also change answers. It just came out over the weekend and seems greatly improved.

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