In this blog, I will post different things. One category that is close to my heart is teaching and my personal experience in it. This post is the first of many. There are many things that I have learned in recent years that have changed my teaching. One of those things is Kahoot. If you don’t know it yet, you should urgently get access and simply try out what it’s all about. In this post, we first look at what Kahoot actually is, how to play Kahoot quiz games, how it works in detail, and what pedagogical uses, advantages, and disadvantages I see here.
What is Kahoot?
Kahoot is a free learning platform where you can create interactive quizzes that you can play with a school class (or at a family party, a company meeting, etc.). You can create the questions yourself, the answer options as well. You can integrate videos, pictures and audio files and thus support the whole thing audiovisually. A simple formula can also be included as a question or answer.
The clue to Kahoot is that the participants can play against each other (more on this below) and collect points. Of course, this appeals to students/relatives/employees because they want to be the best and need to answer as many questions as possible correctly. This thought spurs us on and is also a lot of fun!
In short, this is shown in the official video:
Registration and Login
To register, you have to go to www.kahoot.com and register for free. The registration itself only has to be made by those who want to create a quiz. This means that students can play without registration, which is a huge advantage compared to this type of site that requires registration.
How do you Create a Kahoot Quiz?
About “New K!” you come to the page where you can create a quiz. (This post is dedicated to the easy-to-understand quiz, I will deal with the other options later.) After entering a title and a handful of keywords, you can add pictures or videos there.
If you only want to work for yourself (and your classes), select the appropriate entry under Visibility, choose the language of the questions/answers and use “School” as the audience. What you enter here doesn’t really matter, because you can access it yourself whenever you want.
These entries really make sense if you want to make your Kahoot public. Then powerful keywords, a reasonable title, and an appropriate target group should be the be-all and end-all.
If you are satisfied with your input, you create the Kahoot and will be forwarded to the first question page. Once there, you should first think about the title of the question, can add pictures/videos and choose the answer options. There are four different answer options by default, several of which can be correct. If you need fewer answer options, simply leave the corresponding fields blank. Which answer is correct can easily be set.
Two important options for each question: awarding points and time limit.
Each question has a time limit between 5 and 120 seconds. The default is 20 seconds, which is enough for most questions. This creates a bit of pressure, which most students need. Points are also distributed for each question. If you are correct, you can collect up to 1000 points per question. The points awarded decrease over time so that quick answers can usually reach 900 points.
Important here: if you answer several questions correctly in a row, you get extra points. Means: right goes fast!
If you are satisfied with your questions, you are already done. I myself sometimes created kahoots shortly before class. If you know how to do it, it can be done very quickly.
If you don’t want to create your own quiz, you can also search for suitable kahoots and play them. Here you should definitely look at them yourself.
How do you play Kahoot?
You don’t need much: a computer, a projector, and students who have a smartphone ready. Ideally, with the app, which can be downloaded from the corresponding stores ( Android or Apple ). The whole thing also works in the smartphone browser, but there can sometimes be complications if something does not fit properly.
The quiz leader opens his account, navigates to his Kahoot, throws all of this onto the wall via the projector and the kids receive a game pin that they have to enter to access the Kahoot. Then you can think of a nickname (I’m a fan of real names), and off you go.
The questions are displayed, the pupils can answer them immediately on their own smartphone (via colored buttons) and receive immediate feedback on their answer.
Answers that were given incorrectly can still be discussed after the question. This often shows misconceptions by students that can be incorporated as a diagnosis in the classroom.
Team mode is also excellent. There, several students can play together in a team against other teams. This is particularly useful in classes in which not everyone has their own smartphone. In addition, a team is more and more happy than individual players.
How does Kahoot work Step by Step Guide
Kahoot is the latest hit in the classroom! With Kahoot, a quiz, survey or discussion can be easily created. Kahoot is a game based blended learning platform. Images or videos can be displayed in the questions. Your students will be amazed.
That’s how it’s done.
Log in
So that a quiz can be created, a login is required. This can be done via the Kahoot! Get my free account page. When creating, you will be asked for the role (including teacher, student over or under 16, etc.) school, name, email address and desired password.
Create Quiz
- Log on to the Kahoot! Side by side.
- Click the “New K!” Button
- Select from “Quiz”, “Discussion” or “Survey”.
- Type in the quiz name and click “Go!”
- Create your questions. You can insert pictures or videos, duration of the response time and the correct answer.
- After you have created all questions, click on “Next settings” and set the language, public or private, description of the quiz, etc.
- Click on “Next Cover image” and select the desired start image on your computer.
- Click on “Done”. Your quiz is created and can be accessed at any time via “Me!” changed, copied or deleted.
How to Play Kahoot Quiz Games
- Select the desired quiz from the menu item “Me!” and click “Play.”
- Click “Launch.” Students get Kahoot time! Via your smartphone (Android app) or via the browser https://kahoot.it/.
- Students type in their pin and nickname.
- The logged-in students are now visible on the teacher screen (projector).
- Students complete the quiz and the winner appears at the end.
- Via the menu item “New K!” the evaluation can be downloaded as an Excel document on the right side of the screen. The evaluation is documented in great detail on three different worksheets.
It’s best to start with a test right away; the students will be delighted.
Tip
Via the menu item “Public” you will find further quizzes that you can use. If you select Preview, you can try out the quiz on the screen.
Possible uses of Kahoot quizzes
I use Kahoot for different purposes:
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Repetition:
- It is very good for repetition at the beginning of the lesson when the students have to access the knowledge of the previous unit and have to test themselves
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Securing:
- At the end of an hour, so that the material you have learned or the newly acquired knowledge and skills is consolidated through questions.
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As a cognitive conflict
- Students often think that they already know everything. These (often wrong) pre-concepts can be used by such quizzes to open them up to new knowledge because they realize that they have misunderstood or internalized something wrong.
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Student
- Let your students create Kahoots! They deal intensively with the topics, try to design the most difficult questions possible and learn a lot in the process. One advantage (among many others!): As a teacher, you can play along and show that – just like the students – you are not right on every question.
Advantages and Disadvantages
Advantages:
- Quick and easy to create
- Loosens up lessons
- Spurs thought
- Activates all (!), students
- It is audiovisually supportable
- It is free
- Shows students their own mistakes
- Can also be created by students and may thus be used for self-organized learning
- No fear of wrong answers, because anonymous
- Possibility to also work at home (more on that later, here the official announcement )
- Can also be used via the browser
- Incorrect answers are often a better diagnosis for misunderstood content than asking individual students
Disadvantage:
- It is addictive because you want to play one more right after you. It can take time
- A stable internet connection is urgently needed
- Now and then the connection does not work correctly even with a stable internet
- You need computers and projectors
- You need rudimentary English skills to create
- Students who do not have a smartphone cannot play in 1 vs 1
Final Words
At the end of the entire game round, the three best players are displayed on a podium. The teacher can now save the results. This takes the form of a downloadable Excel file that contains a detailed overview of the round played. You can understand every answer of every player. If the technical equipment allows all students present to take the quiz, the results overview can also be used as a learning status check. So here you see how to play Kahoot quiz games step by step hope you like it.
What possibilities of playful repetition in class do you use? What experience have you had with Kahoot or similar tools? How do students react to you? Let me know!