A Study of Twitter and Clickers as Audience Response Systems in International Relations Courses

Abstract

T he importance of educational technology continues to grow for teachers, students, and administrators. This study examined the use of audience-response systems (ARS) in diverse undergraduate classes in the International Relations and Peace Studies cluster at Ritsumeikan Asia Pacifi c University (APU). The study specifically compared Twitter and Turning Technologies clickers for both academic performance and survey results on student interactivity and attentiveness. The study found that clickers outperformed Twitter in student satisfaction; however, neither had a strong impact on grade performance.This article describes how clickers have a greater but limited advantage over Twitter in the classroom. The success of in-class technology depends on students' technological culture, methods of use, and available logistical resources. AUDIENCE RESPONSE SYSTEMSARS refers to any system in which an audience interacts with a speaker(s) during a presentation. ARS can involve low-technology tools, such as colored cards held up during a presentation, or high-technology dials used to indicate favorability to a speech (e.g., widely used in political-campaign analysis). The purpose of ARS varies based on the goals of a presenter. However, all ARS involve interaction between the audience and the presenter(s).Twitter is an online system in which individuals send messages composed of up to 140 characters to any number of subscribers (i.e., followers). Audiences use Twitter for back-channel communication or short messages to one another or the presenter(s) (Atkinson 2010). Sometimes Twitter is broadcasted on an overhead display to increase transparency and communication between the audience and the presenter(s). A Study of Twitter and Clickers as Audience Response Systems in International Relations Courses Steven B. Rothman, Ritsumeikan Asia Pacifi c UniversityThis study conducted experiments using clickers and Twitter in international relations courses to evaluate the eff ectiveness of audience-response tools on students' experiences and their performance. The study used both within-group and between-group experimental designs and evaluated the results primarily through inferential descriptive statistical methods. The results show that clickers outperformed Twitter, students enjoy using clickers in class, and the use of these tools had little impact on grade performance. ABSTRACTTwitter attempts to take education out of the classroom by allowing students to engage in topics among networks of professionals and peers and increase communication among students, though eff ects are unclear. One study that used Twitter to democratize student involvement had both positive and negative eff ects (Blair 2013). Other research indicates a number of challenges in using online communication tools due to the diff erent social-interactive mechanisms to which we are accustomed (Blair 2013). For example, in face-to-face communication, a person who is asked a question feels more pressure to answer than in an online communication (Middleton 2010). A...

Considerations for using personal Wi-Fi enabled devices as “clickers” in a large university class

“…With increased engagement, students may be more likely to attend classes (Bachman and Bachman, 2011; MacGeorge et al, 2008; Rothman, 2014; Trees and Jackson, 2007). Some studies have utilized clickers as a means of taking attendance and incorporating this into their grade.…”

Measuring the effect of ARS on academic performance: A global meta-analysis

“…However, there are also some disadvantages to the ARS method, particularly the following: malfunctions (Desrochers & Shelnutt, 2012) produced by technology failures (White, Syncox, & Alters, 2011) e mainly in signal transmission (Guse & Zobitz, 2011); economic barriers, due to the high initial cost of acquiring the system, as stated by Desrochers and Shelnutt (2012) and Fern andez-Alem an et al (2014). King and Robinson (2009) and Rothman (2014) state that this means that on some occasions the cost has to be passed directly on to learners. Other authors, such as White et al, (2011), also consider the possibility of cheating as one of the most worrying disadvantages of ARS use, although for Roberson (2009) this technology has the opposite effect, limiting cheating during examinations.…”

“…From an academic point-of-view, as Blasco-Arcas, Buil, Hern andez-Ortega, and Sese (2013) and Rothman (2014) state, research on the use of ARS applications in teaching is quite recent, although studies can be found that cover different academic levels and a range of disciplines. By education level, most studies focus on the university environment, where experiments have been carried out in a number of disciplines in the Experimental Sciences (Addison, Wright, & Milner, 2009;Nicol & Boyle, 2003), the Health Sciences (Levesque, 2011;Patterson, Kilpatrick, & Woebkenberg, 2010) and the Social Sciences (Castillo-Manzano, Castro-Nuño, Sanz Díaz, & Yñiguez, 2015;Stowell & Nelson, 2007).…”

Student Response Systems: A Multidisciplinary Analysis Using Visual Analytics

“…Another innovative design is described by Thompson [125], where it is proposed to improve students' levels of understanding of certain concepts related to political science through SRSs within an electoral system in order to analyze different voting behaviors. SRSs have been compared with social networks (Twitter) in international relations courses, and results revealed that SRSs outperformed Twitter in terms of students' experiences and performance [126].…”