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ClassQuiz: A Free Tool Supporting High-Effect Size Instructional Strategies

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Educators are buzzing around a new Kahoot and Quizziz-like tool available at no cost. This quiz website offers a host of features, the most important being that it doesn’t collect data. If you’ve used other quiz tools, you know data is collected about you and your students for their own use. ClassQuiz asserts that, unlike these other quiz tools, it doesn’t send information to third parties.

Let’s take a closer look at ClassQuiz to see what it can do. You will also see how it aligns with evidence-based instructional strategies as well as see new research updates about those strategies.

Screenshot by author

Git ClassQuiz

Unlike it’s commercial, closed-source competitors, ClassQuiz offers a GitHub website. That means that you could, if you chose, set up ClassQuiz internally in your own server farm. The benefit? You would have sensitive data under organizational control. This is like hosting your own WordPress or Moodle installation.

What Is ClassQuiz?

ClassQuiz works in a simple way. It allows you to take three primary actions:

  • Create a quiz that allows the insertion of pictures/images
  • Explore and find quizzes others have created
  • Import quizzes from Kahoot! that you can then edit in ClassQuiz

As you might imagine, this import option gives you access to the content in a more established tool. Once the quiz has been set up, students select responses, view results, and see a leaderboard.

Screenshot by author

What Security Safeguards Does ClassQuiz Offer?

ClassQuiz boasts of the following features that safeguard student data:

  • No tracking
  • Self-hosting
  • Cost-free
  • Multilingual
  • Dark mode
  • Save quizzes
  • Save quiz results
  • Community-driven

Hot to Get a ClassQuiz Account

Getting an account is easy. Click on the Register button at the top left of the screen, then fill in your desired information, as shown below:

Screenshot by author

You will need to confirm your email address via an email in your inbox. Using your school district or organization email? Be sure to allow emails from classquiz@mawoka.eu.

Once you have a registered account, you can log in and get access to options that include create, import, results, settings, explore, and search.

How to Import a Kahoot!

You can import a Kahoot! by selecting Import, then pasting the link (a.k.a. URL) to a Kahoot! quiz into the box. To keep it simple, I found a Technology and Robots with Star Wars quiz on Kahoot. Note that I did not create the Kahoot! quiz, but I was still able to import it into ClassQuiz.

Screenshot by author

Here’s what the import process looks like in ClassQuiz:

Screenshot by author

And once complete, the imported quiz appears in ClassQuiz ready to be edited, if needed:

Screenshot by author

Two Strategies to Use with Digital Quiz Tools

Tools like Kahoot, Quizziz, and ClassQuiz offer educators access to digital quiz tools. Each of these tools can be useful for teachers and students. That’s because, when used in alignment with research, they can impact student achievement. How? Through the use of high-effect size instructional strategies.

Did You Know?

“When repetition leads to long-term memories, there are physical changes in the brain. Brain memories disappear very quickly unless they are repeated. Our brains are made up of billions of nerve cells or neurons, all connected together. We form memories when some of these pathways become strengthened by being repeatedly used. (Source: Mike Bell, The Fundamentals of Teaching)

Two powerful strategies can inform our use of quiz tools, like ClassQuiz. Those include:

  • Rehearsal (d=0.73). This is a high-effect size strategy that accelerates student learning. It refers to mental techniques designed to help us remember information.
    • It includes memorizing information through repetition. It can involve repeating information upon seeing a visual cue (like images or flashcards).
    • What’s more, team competition as a rehearsal strategy works. That is, the teacher asks questions requiring rehearsed information. Students answer on their own to gain points for their team. (Learn more!)
  • Retrieval Practice (d=0.46) is often referred to as Practice Testing.
    • It is a way to support long-term information retention. It also assists learners in increasing access to the “to-be-remembered” information (source).
    • This strategy can strengthen learning. It does so when the teacher or student draws out information through a variety of approaches. The information is “pulled out” of students’ brains when they are prompted to retrieve it. Example approaches include flashcards and low-stakes quizzes.

With these two strategies in mind, you can approach the use of ClassQuiz to see how effective it is.

If the rehearsal strategy relies on repetition through the viewing of visual cues, how does ClassQuiz work? You can create flashcards in ClassQuiz that feature images. Then, students can select responses to match.

Retrieval practice (or practice testing) relies on students retrieving information from their minds on cue. Low-stakes quizzes, entry/exit cards (a.k.a. bell ringers) work well in ClassQuiz.

Screenshot by author

Shocking Research Update

A new study published in “Psychological Science in the Public Interest“ provides evidence that these strategies are ineffective:

  • Re-reading
  • Highlighting
  • Mnemonics

Pretty shocking, no? If those strategies are ineffective, what strategies are MOST effective?

Whenever you see these three strategies, think of this diagram:

Created by author as adapted from a workshop presentation

Leverage ClassQuiz for Effective Learning

Don’t be afraid to leverage ClassQuiz. It can enhance student use of effective learning strategies. This includes strategies like retrieval practice and rehearsal. Teaching students to engage in distributed and interleaved practice amplifies strategies’ effect. It can ensure long-term information retention beyond re-reading and highlighting.

Feature Image Source

Screenshot by author, ClassQuiz

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podsie
Educational ResearchGood Teaching

Evidence-Based Learning: Introducing Podsie

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Putting evidence-based research into practice can be tough. One of the challenges I encountered was shedding my own flawed beliefs. For example, I had a vague idea of specific strategies that would work in the classroom, which made classroom implementation an ongoing experiment of what worked and what didn’t. In this blog entry, let’s connect an evidence-based research strategy with a digital tool to accelerate student growth.

Strategies

Of course, you already know the value of formative assessment in the classroom. As I mentioned in this blog entry, formative assessment provides feedback that teachers can use to adjust ongoing teaching and learning with one goal: to improve students’ achievement of intended instructional outcomes.

As a K-12 student, I hated quizzes. I came to see them as a poor means of formative assessment. Pop quizzes did review the material, but made me live in fear of the words, “Pop quiz!” Of course, the underlying evidence-based strategy is one you may well be familiar with. But entry and exit tickets, for example, take advantage of Rehearsal Strategy as well as Retrieval Practice (d=0.46):

Also known as “practice testing,” this involves frequent testing. The research is in and it’s positive about “the testing effect.” Flashcards, practice problems, and writing prompts can improve learning. Learn more here.

Here’s a quick video that introduces you to Retrieval Practice:

You can see how I’ve explored this strategy in other blog entries. Different strategies are often introduced along with Retrieval Practice, and these other strategies include spaced vs. mass practice and interleaving:

  • Spaced vs Mass Practice (d=0.65) involves spacing out the intervals of study over a longer period of time.
  • Interleaved Practice (d=0.44) includes a schedule of practice or study where many subjects or topics are mixed to improve learning. Contrast it with “blocked practice,” which has students studying one topic in depth, mastering this topic before moving on to another (source).

Here’s a quick video on Interleaved Practice:

Strategy: Retrieval Practice

Have questions about retrieval practice? Read these frequently asked questions (FAQ). Setting up students to answer questions improves learning. Now that you know that, you’re ready to adapt technologies to match the strategy.

We could choose a wide variety of technologies to match up to retrieval practice. But you’re better off if you pick one digital tool to match one evidence-based strategy. In that way, both you and your students can become proficient at each.

Digital Tool: Introducing Podsie

With increased digital access, teachers can now use a wide variety of strategies and tools to create fresh learning experiences. To add to your toolbox, consider giving Podsie, a free tool for both middle and high school students and teachers, a try. It offers great features at no cost to individual teachers (see school/district pricing).

Podsie combines several research-backed learning strategies. These include retrieval practice, spacing vs massed practice, and interleaving. It relies on customized mastery data of each individual student to enhance learning (source).

As a teacher, create your no-cost Podsie account with a Google or Microsoft account. That’s great because you won’t have to remember another username and password. Once you create your login, you will identify your school from a drop-down list.

podsie

Benefits of Podsie

Podsie automates some of the tasks, and I’ve included several embedded links to explanatory videos that appear in the feature list below.

Podsie:

  • Creates automated, personalized reviews of content aligned to evidence-based practices
  • Relies on a Personal Deck that offers students an ongoing, differentiated review experience
  • Produces realtime data on how students are doing as they review content
  • Details student progress in a Progress Dashboard
  • Assists you in crafting questions about content which will reoccur for students
  • Enables you to share assignments and ask questions through teacher collaboration

Another step the Podsie developers have taken is to provide a lesson plan that will help you in explaining to students:

  • Evidence-based practices like “spacing” and “retrieval”
  • How Podsie helps students retain information they learn throughout the year
  • The science behind remembering

You can see the lesson plan as a Google Slides deck below or get a copy for yourself.

Learn more about Podsie via their Essentials, How-To, and Keys to Success web pages, and find them on social media (Twitter, Facebook) as well.

Connecting Strategy and Tool

As Weston Kieschnick suggests, make every effort to map out what you will be doing in a lesson. Also, make sure you know exactly how students will be relying on technology to learn. Follow his five action steps to master the art of successfully blending strategies with technology.

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Image adapted by author via Podsie

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vimboard
Educational ResearchWeb 2.0 Tool

Use This Puzzle Maker Tool for Retrieval Practice

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Ready to dig into game-based learning? While you’re waiting for a new TCEA Game-Based Learning course, I have a treat for you. This a tool that many educators are relying on in the midst of hybrid teaching and learning. It’s like other quiz show type programs.

Introducing Vimboard

A modern puzzle-making tool, Vimboard (@vimboard1) creates an interactive learning experience by combining puzzle making with a multiple choice question set. As students respond with correct answers, an image appears. Vimboard is free and you can use any of its pre-existing puzzles and content to get started. Here’s one example:

This example game focuses on students responding to physical/chemical change questions. As they respond, they get to see the image shown above. You will explore this in more detail in a moment. Before you do that, let’s revisit the importance of retrieval practice, also known as practice testing.

A Low-Stress Retrieval Practice Activity

Contrary to popular belief, multiple choice questions can enhance learning. Consider the research on their use:

  • Multiple-choice retrieval can be just as effective, or more effective, than short answer retrieval (McDermott et al., 2014).
  • Providing students with feedback decreases or eliminates students’ learning of misinformation (Butler & Roediger, 2008).
  • While they’re are quick to administer and grade, you should take some time to create multiple-choice questions and alternatives carefully for a larger retrieval benefit (Little et al., 2012).
  • Multiple-choice questions enhance learning for related information that wasn’t even on the quiz (Bjork et al., 2014) (source: Retrieval Practice).

Vimboard offers a simple way to quiz students on any topic. Successful answers yield access to a picture. Vimboard will also keep track of how well your students, did, as you can see in the screenshot below.

Vimboard offers an easy-to-use, simple quiz tool. This can be useful for retrieval practice or practice testing, both low-risk assessments that assist students. Some recommendations for using Vimboard for practice testing include:

  • Use quizzes often. This provides students with feedback on whether they are right or wrong in their grasp of concepts and vocabulary. These strategies can lead to deeper understanding, not only memorization of facts.
  • Keep it low stakes. Avoid grading the use of Vimboard. The goal is to spread out assessments over time, as you can see in the figure below.
  • Revisit old content. Don’t be afraid to make quiz questions about content you have already covered. In this way, students are able to better learn and retain content they have been introduced to before.

As you can see in the image below, which represents practice testing (a.k.a. retrieval practice), spreading out short assessments over time can yield great results for long-term retention.

Explore Vimboard Educational Puzzles

The heart of Vimboard is its interactive search for existing educational puzzles. From K-12 through a wide variety of subjects (shown below), you can find many pre-created puzzles to use.

When you view an existing puzzle, you see both the puzzle image and questions. The answer choices to each question appear below each. For example, the questions and answers for the chemical/physical change puzzle are:

You can add any educational puzzle you find to your collection. This makes it possible for you to edit the collection. Or, if you prefer, you can use the share icon to make it available to others online, such as your students or colleagues.

Once shared, students enter their names and work through the questions. A nice feature is that the questions are read aloud to students if they tap on the sound icon beneath the question. You can see a walkthrough of the process below.

Puzzle Game Creation

Want to take a stab at creating your own game? This is a three step process:

  • Introduction: In this step, you provide a title for the game, write a description, and select subject and grade level.
  • Image: In this next area, you provide a picture and decide on the number of tiles that will cover the picture. As students respond to questions correctly, they will remove the tiles that cover the image. Ten tiles means you can have ten questions. You are not required to match one for one (question:tiles). You could provide less questions and Vimboard will remove a portion of the tiles.
  • Quiz: This is where you enter the actual questions and responses. These are in multiple choice format.

How do you imagine you will use Vimboard to support retrieval practice in your classroom?

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Screenshot by author.

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screenshot by author - blooket
Educational ResearchWeb 2.0 Tool

Assessment-Based Feedback Tool: Blooket

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

By now, most of you have tried Kahoot!, Quizlet, Quizziz, and many others. These tools work as game-based student response systems that provide you with formative assessment options. The teacher creates a free account and then can design quizzes with embedded images and video or use one of the many pre-created assessments. Students rely on an internet-connected device to respond, earning points as they score.

All of these assessment tools and many others such as Knowt offer teachers and students a way to engage in practice testing. They also provide pre-assessment and post-assessment data for instructional coaching. In this blog entry, I’ll introduce you to yet another formative assessment tool you may be unaware of.

First, though, let’s review some of the scientifically-based research around two key concepts: practice testing and assessment-based feedback.

Digging into the Research

As you already know, “formative assessment [serves] as a way to improve the caliber of still-underway instructional activities.” Contrast formative assessment with summative assessment. The latter is “a way to determine the effectiveness of already-completed instructional activities” (source: ASCD). A deeper definition of formative assessment appears below:

Formative assessment is a process used by teachers and students during instruction that provides feedback to adjust ongoing teaching and learning to improve students’ achievement of intended instructional outcomes.

Formative assessment has distinguishing features that include it being:

  • A process rather than a single event
  • A tool useful to both teachers and students
  • A source of assessment-based feedback to both teachers and students

As you may already know from TCEA TechNotes blog entries on feedback (d=0.64), assessment-based feedback must do the following:

  • Focus on the task or product, identifying whether it is correct/incorrect or provide suggestions for improvement
  • Provide information about processes students go through to perform a task or develop a product
  • Give insight into students’ ability to self-monitor and direct their learning through goal setting, self-assessments, and identifying next steps

What are some digital tools that can provide feedback insights to task or product? In addition to formative assessments, what are some ways student learning can be improved? Practice testing (d=0.46) is one approach. Practice testing is also known as retrieval practice or test-enhanced learning.

That video will give you an overview of practice testing and Knowt. Allow me to introduce you to a new tool you can use for retrieval practice.

Introducing Blooket

Another exciting digital tool, Blooket, supports teacher and student accounts. With a free account, teachers can use Blooket to host a question set with a specific game mode. This game is displayed via screen/projector, then students compete on their own devices. Blooket tracks student progress, keeping a record of student responses. In turn, students are able to track their statistics via global a leaderboard ranking. They can also buy and sell “blooks” and avail themselves of community-wide events.

Here are some observations from teachers:

  • “In Blooket, you’re given 8+ different possible game modes that use the same question set. Kids can gain points in different ways in each game mode. Blooket enjoys a ‘classic’ mode that is like regular Kahoot. Kids love it because they can play a different game mode to keep it interesting.”
  • “Many of the games are fun and encourage classroom engagement.”
  • “You can play it live or assign it as homework. It has made this year so much more fun for my classes since it works with distance, hybrid, and in person students.”

As you might imagine, Blooket’s game modes offer variety. “It offers power ups and random sabotage things you can do to other players,” says another teacher. You can follow these steps to get started:

  1. Start with a question set. You can make your own, import one, or find one.
  2. Decide on a game mode. There are several game mode choices. Find one you like.
  3. Host a game and allow students to play. Students use a game identification number to join the game.
  4. Play the game. As students play the game, they answer questions that target content that has been taught in class.
  5. Review results. Students and teachers can review the performance data to identify areas of growth.

Don’t let the blocks turn you off from using Blooket with secondary students. One high school Spanish teacher (@SenoraCMT) raves about her use of Blooket in this way:

We were reading a chapter in Kristy Placido’s Noche de oro eBook and I wanted to pre-teach some of the vocabulary. Not pre-teach… more like pre-expose! So I made a Blooket.

After playing our first Blooket, I wanted to add one for ALLLLLL the things my students were studying so I made one for my book Bianca Nieves from Fluency Matters, I made one for my Huellas 1 Future and Conditional level 3-AP unit Atrévete, and Kristy Placido made one for my Huellas 1 ART based level 3-AP unit Bajo la mesa! When my Spanish 4 group finishes reading, I’ll make one for our next Huellas 2 unit, Orangután en mi habitación. (Find out more about the Huellas Curriculum here.)

Now that we know how it works, let’s take a look at some of the available features.

A Few of Blooket’s More Recent Features

Blooket has an amazing amount of features that enhance game mode learning. Some new free features include the following:

  • Extend/Reopen Homework
  • Discover Tab Filters
  • Automated Group Subscriptions
  • Button to Set Time Limit for All Questions
  • Remove Students from Homework

More features are available at a cost. Those include:

  • Removing the 60-player limit (+ Only)
  • Merging Question Sets (+ Only)

Curious about what Blooket looks like? Let’s take a  look at pricing before I turn you loose to watch a few videos.

Blooket’s Cost

“I do pay for Blooket premium because it allows me to duplicate sets and have more in-depth reports,” reports one teacher. Wondering how much Blooket costs? Remember, you get free access to many features such as creating and hosting question sets in a variety of game modes. The free version also comes with unlimited question sets and the ability to edit those. In the table below, you will see what else you can get if you decide to pay for it:

Look Before Leaping

Ready to see what Blooket looks like in action? Here is a quick two-minute video you can watch to get an overview. Below this video, you will find even more walkthrough videos you can take advantage of. Check out this fantastic video from Master Heebs:

Some additional videos you can look at before leaping into Blooket:

Please let me know what you think about it in the comments.

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formative assessment screenshot of testmoz
Content AreasGood Teaching

Formative Assessment Tools for Remote Learning

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Building a formative assessment toolkit is key at a time when remote learning is a necessity. In this blog entry, we’ll explore two tools you may be unfamiliar with. Before we do that, let’s review why quiz tools can accelerate student learning.

Retrieval Practice

In past blog entries, I’ve explored retrieval practice tools you can use for remote formative assessment. When you’re online, it doesn’t matter how remote you are. The key is being able to push students to take, and/or make their own, practice tests.

Research shows that retrieval practice has an effect size of 0.46. Since we’ve covered that in another blog entry, let’s focus on two exciting tools. Special thanks to Keith Schoch for sharing his insight as a comment on Class Discussions Gone Digital.

assessment toolkit

Expand Your Toolkit

Two new formative assessment tools that may have escaped your notice include Spiral and Testmoz. Let’s take a moment to explore each. Neither of these tools is free, but there are trials you can take advantage of. Before deciding to use this on a long-term basis, check with your school supervisor (or someone who controls the budget).

Quickfire Lite is one of Spiral’s free features.

Assessment Tool #1: Spiral

Offering a free account, a 30-day free trial, or $5 monthly/$50 annual fee, Spiral has some special attributes.

About Spiral

Spiral connects you to your students in class with a code. You can then carry out formative assessments, allow your students to collaborate on group tasks or ask questions during video.  Reports allow teachers and students to reflect on how to improve. Sign up for a free trial at Spiral.ac and contact them for institution plans. (Source: Spiral YouTube Channel)

They describe their features in the following way:

  • Free Features:
    • Google Classroom, Clever, and Edmodo integration
    • Verbal, formative assessment tool (record a question and receive student responses)
    • Run live activities with students for review and grading
    • Exit tickets
    • Student and teacher dashboard
    • Feedback and grading
    • Class roster
  • Fee Required:
    • Video-based activities, team activities, interactive activities
    • Ability to import presentations from PowerPoint/Google Slides
    • Collaborative activities for students
    • Out of class student assignments

Spiral makes the point that you do NOT need to integrate it with your school’s learning management system (e.g. Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams, Schoology). While this is nice, grading features would benefit from integration with more than Google Classroom.

Clip, one of Spiral’s features, reminds me of Flipgrid. It allows you to turn any public video into “a live chat with questions and quizzes.” As the teacher, you can watch the class as they engage in several activities. Those activities include answering questions posed via Quickfire Lite option.

Did You Know?

Sign up for one of our Google Certified Educator certifications. You’ll learn about more than Google Meet, as well as earn 12 CPE hours per course. Use these courses to get Google Educator certified. Find out more online.

Assessment Tool #2: Testmoz

Need to create tests for your class? Give Testmoz a try. With the free version, you can “build, distribute and collect the results of a basic test.” This includes up to fifty questions and one hundred results per test. Testmoz has a wide variety of features, but if you want all of them, you will need to pay $50 a year for it.

One nice offering from Testmoz is that they discount fifty percent for “government/non-profit school teachers.” At $25 a year, this makes Testmoz an amazing resource. And school districts can buy the source code for $10,000 so they can load it on their own server(s). Testmoz reminds of a free, open source quiz tool that I explored many years ago. The developer has done a nice job creating a simple, straightforward tool.

Many course management systems (e.g. Canvas, Moodle) offer features similar to what Testmoz offers at a fraction of the cost. This makes it easy to integrate or use. What’s more, Testmoz relies on email notifications for use with older students and offers a nice dashboard for teachers:

assessment toolkit

Formative Assessment at a Distance

If you find yourself in need for a fresh way to assess students remotely, consider Spiral with its dis-associative approach. Students simply enter a code and they are in. Testmoz, on the other hand, offers a rich feature set for question formulation. Remember that retrieval practice can accelerate student learning. How you accomplish it will depend on what tools you and your students have available.

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knowt
Good Teaching

Test-Enhanced Learning Made Simple with Knowt

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

The research is clear: rereading a text doesn’t work as well as taking a test over the material. Known as retrieval practice, it involves students studying a passage of text. Then, students take a low-stakes test about it. In this blog entry, we’ll explore a tool that empowers students to make their own tests.

The Testing Effect

“Retrieval practice” involves frequent testing or quizzing. Students take practice tests over a period of time. This pushes them to recall material from memory. In time, this assists students with remembering the material. Research shows that students recall more information from practice testing than rereading.

Practice testing has an effect size of .46. The Visible Learning Meta X database describes it in this way:

Practice testing is a well-established strategy for improving student learning. The aim of practice testing is to support long-term retention. It is also to increase access to retrieving the “to-be-remembered” information. Sometimes called retrieval practice, practice testing, or test-enhanced learning.

Let’s take a look at some research. These results compare studying versus practice testing as a way to increase retention:

  • Studying
    • Need information retained for a short time? Study it.
    • Studying over fewer, longer sessions is less effective than its alternative. The alternative is spacing out the intervals of study over a longer period of time. This is called Spaced vs massed practice and enjoys an effect size of .65.
  • Practice Testing
    • Need long-term retention of information? Use practice testing.
    • Testing has a greater impact than repeated study when done over time.
    • Testing after reading improves students’ ability to answer questions. That includes questions that are “in the text” and “in the head.”
    • Testing done once a day after covering material increased retention
    • Students tested often had increased retention.
    • It doesn’t matter what form the questions take. Students gain the benefit of practice testing regardless of question type. All questions were as effective as the others at enhancing the students’ learning. Question types include:
      • multiple-choice,
      • short-answer, and
      • hybrid questions

You can deepen the impact of practice testing if students receive feedback. Delayed feedback yields better results. That’s no surprise since feedback has an effect size of .64 itself.

What’s convenient about practice testing is teachers or students can create the test. The question is, what’s the best way to do that?

Reviewing High-Effect Size Strategies

Before we jump into the technology side of this, notice that there may be a happy confluence. The confluence is of high-effect size strategies that include the following:

It’s easy to see how these powerful strategies speed growth in a year and a half in a school year. Ok, now that’s out of the way, let’s review some technology tools.

Ways to Create Practice Tests

Although teachers can make a practice test, there’s a benefit to students making it. No doubt, teachers are making tests using various tools that support quizzing.

Some of those tools teachers use include the following:

While students can use these tools, there is another one available.

Student-Created Quizzes

As a high school student, I stumbled upon a technique that I wish someone had told me about earlier. That is, how to read a selection of text then select content that might appear on a test. At the time, I did not create a test. I highlighted, wrote down or summarized critical test information. It was only later that I would reformulate my notes into test questions. This technique was quite effective in history classes, which I made straight “As” in.

Students can now use a free service to turn their notes into practice quizzes. Students can use an online notebook, or import their notes. The imported notes can be in Google Docs, or Word format. Once imported, the student click a button and their notes get turned into a quiz.

Wondering what the digital tool is that can students can use? Asking yourself what tool can they use to get a .47 effect size boost to knowledge retention? Let’s find out.

Meet Knowt: Get to Know Your Notes

Students can take their online notes, click a button, and a quiz appears. Knowt features fill in the blank, multiple choice or short answer questions. Recall that question type doesn’t matter for practice testing. Instead, it’s the repetition on a daily basis to allow for spaced practice (.65 effect size).

For fun, I asked Knowt to import a tough Google Doc. The Google Doc? Matching High-Effect Size Instructional Strategies and Digital Tools. It created a twenty-five question quiz out of the content.

Here’s the first question:

In case you’re wondering, the answer is C. Performance. How did Knowt do this? Knowt describes their process in this way:

First, we take your notes and analyze them using machine learning. On our server, the A.I. determines the best question formats for each sentence. Once it knows the best questions, the algorithm sends it to the web or mobile app for you to take a quiz. It only takes seconds. At the end, you get great quizzes that are custom made from your notes that you can take anywhere you go.

In this 25-question quiz that I created from complicated content, the questions made sense and worked. Here’s what my notes looked like in Knowt:

Fiction vs Non-Fiction

For fun, I decided to drop one of my favorite stories into Knowt. The story? Frank Stockton’s The Lady or the Tiger (online).  One of my favorite teachers, Fr Richard O’Shaughnessy, introduced it to my classmates and I. Like everyone else, we agonized over the ending.

Knowt turned the story into another 25-question quiz. Some of the questions were not reasonable, but if you have to know it cold, Knowt works great.

Watch a Video

Need a quick way to get started? Check out esteemed educator, Richard Bryne, as he shares a demo of GetKnowt.

A teacher’s edition is under development and is due out in April 2020. That’s right around the corner. Sign up for the beta.

Making an AI-powered quiz of study materials has never been easier. Give Knowt a try. Want to share quizzes you create as a teacher? The Knowt Teacher’s Edition makes it possible. It also features a class section, student management, and more. Pilot programs for the teacher’s edition are also available.

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Feature image. Screenshot by author.

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