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Activate students with questions

Quizzes and polls activate students and make them co-creators of their knowledge. Here is an explanation of how you, as a teacher, can easily use a quiz or poll in most learning activities. You will also find help with how you can start creating quizzes and polls that suit your course.

Activate students with quizzes and polls

Mentimeter increase students’ attention

In a study by Mayhew et al. (2020) students express that the use of Mentimeter increases their attention and learning during lesson time. The study believes that the use of Mentimeter has the potential to increase students’ engagement and satisfaction with their education.

Students learn better if they are active co-creators of their knowledge than if they are passive recipients. Quizzes and polls can be weaved into most learning activities. They provide a simple educational gain because they increase student engagement and contribute to interactivity. Other positive results of questions to students may be that:

  • students get an idea of their knowledge gaps
  • you get a feel for the students' level of knowledge
  • the students find it fun and get engaged.

What you get from quizzes and polls depends on your purpose with them and how they are designed. For example, there is a difference between questions that are the basis for grades in the course and questions used for the students to learn the course content. On the following pages, you will find guides and recommendations for using quizzes and polls in your course.

Areas of use

As a teacher, do you wonder when you can use quizzes and polls in your education? Here you can read about different areas of use with explanations and short examples. Examples include activating your students, collecting feedback, creating polls, and conducting graded assessment.

Areas of use for quizzes and polls

Get started with quizzes and polls

Getting started with quizzes and polls can seem complicated, so here's how you, as a teacher, can get started quickly and create questions with a strategy. It is also essential to plan how you handle the answers and to choose a suitable tool. KTH offers four quiz and poll tools within courses: Mentimeter, Zoom Polls, Canvas quizzes and Möbius (through Canvas).

Get started with quizzes and polls

Formulate questions and answer options

What is essential when creating a quiz or poll question, and how do you write credible incorrect answer options? Here you can, for example, read about the importance of clear language with fewer negation structures and how to set the right level of questions. You also get tips on when different answer forms are appropriate and what to consider when creating reasonable incorrect answer options.

Formulate questions and answer options

Formulate useful feedback

Feedback is an important part of education, but how do you write good feedback on quiz questions? Here it is explained why good feedback should problematise the answer and how you design the feedback according to how you use the quiz. You also get tips on how to create feedback for automatically assessed quizzes.

Formulate useful feedback on quizzes