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Running head: STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 1
The Impact of Student Response Systems in the
Secondary and Post-Secondary Classroom
Gina Lobdell
Purdue University
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 2
Abstract
Education is constantly evolving and changing. Instructors have to figure out
innovative ways to meet the learning needs of their students and to ensure student
performance is successfully achieved. How will instructors be able to effectively
teach, differentiate learning, and also provide a student-‐centered, interactive
learning environment? Technological tools such as Student Response Systems (SRS),
(Kaleta & Joosten, 2007), Audience Response Systems (ARS) (Penuel et al., 2007),
Classroom Response Systems (CRS) (Beatty & Gerace, 2009), or clickers (Bergtrom,
2006) can be used to enhance instruction and improve student comprehension and
performance. Students use these wireless, hand-held, interactive devices to anonymously
and remotely respond to questions projected on a computer by the instructor. Instructors
receive dynamic, immediate feedback to assess student understanding and mastery of
content. This paper seeks to examine the positive and negative impacts of student
response system usage in secondary and post-secondary environments, present a
comparative analysis of usage in both settings, and discuss potential challenges with
usage today and in the future.
Keywords: student response systems, classroom response systems, audience
response systems, clicker, constructivism, student performance
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 3
The Impact of Student Response Systems in the
Secondary and Post-Secondary Classroom
According to Kay, Lesage, and Knaack (2010), Student Response Systems (SRS)
were developed in the mid-1960s but not fully mainstreamed and used in secondary and
higher education until 2003. An early generation SRS, called Classtalk, was developed in
1985 and became available for commercial use from the early to mid1990s (Beatty,
2004). It consisted of graphing calculators for student response submission, a Macintosh
computer for instructor question input and all components were then hard-wired onto a
network (Beatty, 2004). Classtalk set the standard for future SRS generations. From the
late 1990s until present, SRSs have taken on a newer, sleeker, user-friendly appearance.
Each student uses a wireless “clicker” (Beatty, 2004, p.3) that looks more like a TV
remote control for response input. Once students anonymously enter and submit their
clicker responses to multiple-choice questions displayed on the instructor’s computer,
infrared signals (IRs) transmit clicker responses to receptors located at the front of the
room (Beatty, 2004). The instructor receives immediate student response results and
feedback that can be depicted on a graphical bar chart showing how many students
selected each question choice (Gok, 2011). The instructor can evaluate student response
results to determine if student mastery was attained. Instruction can then be adjusted
accordingly to address any learning gaps. Figure 1 shows a graphical representation of
SRS use.
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 4
Figure 1. Student Response System Diagram (Gok, 2011, p. 67)
Comparative Analysis of SRS Usage
According to Kay et al. (2010), there is ample research on SRS usage in higher
education but little research has been done on SRS usage at the secondary level Prior to
Kay et al.’s (2010) comprehensive formative analysis of SRS secondary classroom usage
in 2009, the only other complete previous study of SRS usage in a K-12 classroom setting
was done by Penuel, Crawford, Boscardin, and Masyn in 2006. The Kay et al. (2010)
survey study in 2009 focused on the benefits and challenges of SRS usage at the
secondary level and how instructional approaches affected SRS usage for summative,
mixed and formative assessment. The Penuel et al. (2007) survey study focused on SRS
implementation and usage among K-12 teachers and addressed “the following four
research questions:
1. For what purposes do K-12 teachers use student response system
technologies?
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STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 5
2. Can we identify distinct profiles of use of response systems among teachers
using these systems?
3. If so, are such profiles associated with particular characteristics of teachers,
classrooms, or professional development experiences?
4. Do perceptions or the effects of response systems on teaching and learning
correlate with particular profiles of use?” (Penuel et al., 2007, p. 321)
Before Penuel et al. (2007) conducted the initial survey study, they reviewed the
impact of SRS usage in higher education. Based on their higher education research, they
expected K-12 teachers would also have different goals and objectives for using SRSs
(Penuel et al., 2007). They figured teachers might use SRSs to benchmark and evaluate
how well students perform on standardized or end-of-year assessments or as a means to
enhance student motivation and engagement (Penuel et al., 2007).
In higher education, instructors use SRSs to ask questions focusing on specific
concepts and require students to answer questions anonymously. Students can also be
paired with a peer to discuss questions with each other before responding (Suchman,
Uchiyama, Smith & Bender, 2009). Student responses are shown to the entire class and
students are given an opportunity to discuss their responses to the questions. Penuel et al.
(2007) predicted K-12 teachers would adopt similar higher education pedagogical
strategies mentioned above into SRS classroom usage. These strategies are known as
constructivist, or student-centered learning, and allows students to actively participate in
their learning so they can make meaning of new concepts learned (Suchman et al., 2009).
Penuel et al. (2007) also found that teachers who use a constructivist, or student-centered,
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 6
approach to learning and instruction are more open to implementing new technologies in
their classrooms.
The results of the Penuel et al. (2007) study concluded that K-12 teachers used
SRSs primarily for the purpose of improving the student learning and instructional
process through formative and summative assessment. As was predicted, teachers also
implemented pedagogical strategies into SRS usage, such as having students respond to
questions then review content after student responses were entered to measure student
comprehension for content mastery. Teachers also utilized SRS data and feedback
frequently to modify instruction as needed (Penuel et al., 2007). On the other hand,
teachers didn’t use the SRS as often to ask student questions that would stimulate higher
order thinking and didn’t discuss or reflect on student responses to promote student
interaction and engagement as is done at the post-secondary level (Penuel et al., 2007).
To summarize the analysis, it’s crucial and important for teachers at the secondary level
to be trained to make the most effective use of SRSs.
Benefits
There are many benefits associated with SRS implementation and usage in
secondary and higher education. According to Kay et al. (2010), the benefits of SRS
usage in secondary classroom settings included more positive student attitudes, increases
in student involvement, higher student attention spans, formative assessment to help
students review and prepare for tests, getting overall feedback, opportunities for students
to compare their responses with other peers, and for student memory retention.
In higher education, SRS usage benefits are very similar. A research study
conducted by Lundeberg, Kang, Wolter, delMas, Armstrong, Borsari, Boury, Brickman,
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 7
Hannam, and Heinz (2011) found that the implementation and use of “interactive Clicker
Case Studies” (Lundeberg et al., 2011, p. 645) in undergraduate, introductory biology
classrooms increased student understanding and comprehension, engagement and
attention. According to Lundeberg et al. (2011), “a Clicker Case is a story (e.g., a
problem someone is facing) that uses clickers (student response systems) to engage
students in understanding the meaning of science contained within the story” (Lundeberg
et al., 2011, p. 645). Another study done by Morin, Thomas, Barrington, Dyer,
Boutchkova, Daly, and Gijbels (2009), called the “Clicker Project” (Morin et al., 2009, p.
97), sought to examine whether SRS usage contributed to increased student content
knowledge, comprehension and peer interaction in an undergraduate International
Finance course. The results indicated that with SRS use student talking during class
diminished and increased student learning by improving problem solving and critical
thinking skills (Morin et al., 2009).
According to Beatty (2004), SRS usage allows students in post-secondary
classrooms to become more engaged and active in the learning process. Unlike traditional
lecture instruction, SRS usage enables students to process information, understand and
comprehend concepts more fully because they “develop a more solid, integrated, useful
understanding of concepts and their interrelationships and applicability” (Beatty, 2004, p.
5). In addition, students and instructors enjoy receiving feedback because students have
an opportunity to view their responses compared to the whole class and instructors are
able to assess and measure student comprehension before and after class lectures (Morin
et al., 2009). Table 1 shows three SRS benefit groups: “student involvement, learning
and assessment” (Gok, 2011, p. 68) and related benefit components.
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 8
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STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 9
Challenges
There are also some challenges associated with SRS usage in secondary
classroom settings. According to Kay et al. (2010), some of the challenges students
experienced with SRS usage included an uncertainty in SRS functionality and whether it
would work correctly to tabulate student responses, having to learn how to use a new
technological tool, stress and pressure with having to learn and understand concepts at a
rapid pace, feelings of insecurity about entering individual student responses, and
decreased learning performance due to questions not being available after students
submitted their responses and the anxiety associated with having to respond to questions
so quickly (Kay et al., 2010).
SRS usage challenges in higher education are also very similar to those in
secondary education. Gok (2011) presented three main groups of SRS challenges:
“Technology-Based, Instructor-Based, and Student-Based” (Gok, 2011, p. 70) and
associated challenge elements. According to Gok (2011), some technology-based
challenges with SRS use included remotes not working right, students forgetting to bring
their remotes to class or losing their remotes and, consequently, couldn’t participate.
Instructor-based challenges with SRS use consisted of instructors not having enough time
to develop SRS questions and couldn’t cover as much course content as they’d like.
Also, instructors with less SRS experience couldn’t modify instruction based on student
response feedback (Gok, 2011). Some student-based challenges with SRS use indicated
that students had a hard time adjusting to a new method of learning, required a lot of
work to use SRSs, thought whole class discussion was confusing, didn’t like SRSs to be
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 10
used for summative assessment nor to check attendance for grades, wanted to keep their
anonymity, and negative feedback made them feel bad (Gok, 2011).
Conclusion
Research studies show SRS usage benefits outweigh the challenges but
there are still improvements to be made. Research studies support SRS usage in
secondary and post-secondary settings as they result in more positive impacts on student
learning, increased student engagement and improved performance. Peer collaboration
and discussion is a vital component of effective implementation of SRS in higher
education and needs to be incorporated more frequently at the secondary level.
Pedagogical strategies implemented into SRS usage successfully improve student
learning and instruction at the secondary and post-secondary level. Secondary and post-
secondary instructors with large class sizes can also utilize SRSs to accommodate the
needs of many learners.
Though there are plentiful research studies that indicate more positive and
beneficial SRS usage in higher education, there is still a need for SRS usage research in
secondary school settings. There are still many unknown variables that need to be
explored to explain why SRS usage research studies are not being conducted as often at
the secondary level compared to higher education. The most recent SRS usage research
study at the secondary level was completed in Canada and not in the United States.
STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN EDUCATION 11
References
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