T3: Technology Tips and Tricks
Using Quia in the Classroom
Two of our current Educational Technology students highlighted Quia, a company providing many different web-based tools for educators, in their Sharing Tips and Tricks section of their classes. Charles Kubolz, a Certificate student this past summer, highlighted Quia in the Sharing Tips and Tricks discussion in MACUL Space. To read Charles’ summary please visit the second page of the Sharing Tips and Tricks discussion for the EduTech Group on MACUL Space. (http://maculspace.ning.com/group/msuedutech).
In addition, Rehab Rajab, a MAET Plymouth student, demonstrated how it worked in her class this summer and has provided a brief write up for this newsletter.
I use Quia to create quizzes, games, activities, surveys, class WebPages and online calendars for my classes. I create a class roster at the beginning of the year which automatically creates a user name and a password for each student; those are usually e-mailed to the students or printed off and given to them by the teacher. By creating an account for each student in my class, I can track their work as they log on every time they do one of my activities. Students also like to see their scores which are easily seen when they log into their accounts even from home where they can share it with their parents.
There are sixteen activity templates to choose from when creating a new activity such as Battleship, Cloze, Challenge Board, Concentration, Flashcards and many others. When an activity is created, the teacher has the option to share it with others or keep it private which creates a bank of activities that teachers can search and copy into their accounts.
I use the Quizzes feature the most. Quizzes that are created by Quia can be taken online or printed off. Teachers can choose from 16 types of questions where inserting images and audio files are possible. When a quiz is created, all the questions in this quiz are saved in the teacher’s bank of questions. So the questions are saved even if the quiz is deleted later on. Quizzes can be automatically graded and students see their scores immediately. Open ended questions can be graded by the teacher online. The great thing about this feature is that it keeps the whole process electronic and thus no paper is wasted. The same quiz can be copied for different classes with different passwords, time limits and number of attempts.
I create a customized Webpage for each class where I can post messages, recommend activities and websites, and assign homework with downloadable files for my students. I also use it as an electronic bulletin board where I announce scores and award some students. The calendar option makes it possible to post deadlines and quiz dates online as well. It helps the students become independent by following up what’s happening on the class webpage themselves.
Quia saved me a lot of time and effort.
-Rehab Rajab, MSU MAET Plymouth Student
Tags: quia, technology tips, web 2.0, web-based tools