In an ideal world, teachers and students would work together to invent technologies that would truly serve them in the classroom. And yes, maybe you would want a hard-core technologist on hand, too, to make sure the idea really worked.
And doing the idea is just what Louise Waters, superintendent and chief executive of Leadership Public Schools, had in mind when she gave her blessing to a project now called "ExitTicket."
ExitTicket is a classroom and feedback system designed to work on any wifi-enabled smartphone or tablet, a "bring your own device" approach. Students and teachers download the software on their gadgets. At any point in the lesson -- or before students are getting ready to bolt out the door -- the teacher can put up a "Quicket," a short poll or quiz to gauge whether students are absorbing the lessons.
“ExitTicket is more than just a simple voting/polling clicker or interactive student response system,” says Waters. "Because each student has their own personalized learning account, they know exactly how they are performing over time, and exactly where their strengths and weaknesses are." Teachers can measure student performance over time, too.
It enables students and teachers to get real-time feedback at any time during class. Teachers can select questions from a database or choose their own as the basis for quizzes, polls, and other "rich media questions". ExitTicket really shines as a pulse-test of whether most students understood the core of a lesson--before they walk out the door. We first wrote about Exit Ticket after they joined the Education Pavilion the 2012 Maker Faire. The tool -- which was then beta-tested across Leadership Public Schools as a web app -- now offers a Lite version to teachers free of charge. The accompanying student module is available via web or through the iTunes App Store.
