Using clickers in the statistics classroom can help students identify and understand common errors and misconceptions through a combination of surprise and discussion. Students are presented with multiple-choice questions that they discuss with each other and then vote on; a class-wide discussion follows. Questions for which many students vote for…

We recorded the percentage of students voting on each option on every clicker question used in 19 introductory statistics classes. To identify the questions that provide the most useful feedback, we looked for those for which the percentage of students voting correctly varied the most from class to class, producing the largest standard deviations.…

Classroom voting can be an effective way to stimulate student discussions. In this pedagogy, the instructor poses a multiple-choice question to the class, and then allows a few minutes for consideration and small-group discussion before students vote, either with clickers, cell phones, or a non-electronic method. After the vote the instructor…