In DyKnow 5.0, it was common practice to write a poll question on a reserved panel. Then during the DyKnow Session, you would bring up a quick poll, select the appropriate answer choices, and that would be that. This was a very simple and elegant way to alert students to the poll choices and simultaneously prepare the poll ahead of time.
In 5.1 you were newly able to send out a full question and answer selection that your students would see in their poll selection window. This made it abundantly clear what the question and answers were even without projecting the panel or sharing it in your Session, but these questions and answers were not preparable before class. This means that anytime you wanted to send out one of the types of polls, you had to take the time to type (or copy/paste) everything in.
For the PowerPoint integration, we combined the best of both worlds by allowing you to insert a new poll object into your notebooks. Now you can prepare full question/answer polls (and even specify them as anonymous for potentially-sensitive discussions) before class. During class, you can send that poll to the students for them to answer by clicking the Launch Poll button on the poll object. This will then send the poll complete with questions and answers to the students for them to answer. In addition, since the poll is part of a panel, the question and answers will be sent to all the students as part of their notes. This will be a big time saver when it comes to creating these custom polls and will more easily allow reuse of polls as they can be copy/pasted between different notebooks or panels.
An interesting consequence of having the prepared poll be an object on a panel is that students can make them as well. Only moderators can actually send the polls to be answered, but students will have the ability to insert a poll object on the panel and then submit that panel to the moderator. Then you, as the moderator, can look at the polls that are submitted, append them to the Session or to a new notebook, and then have the students take the poll by clicking the button.
I remember one of the most interesting exams I ever took in college was the exam where I was tasked with writing my own exam questions and answers. Despite the fact that I clearly knew all the answers to the questions, it may have been the most difficult exam I took. There is a different level of critical thinking necessary to come up with difficult yet not impossible questions about content. For one you are obviously required to know enough about the subject to produce several questions, but more so you have to determine what questions demonstrate an adequate understanding of the subject. This higher-level critical engagement with the content is what makes e-Portfolios such a powerful method of assessment. I think there may be a lot of potential for very exciting uses of this new feature. As I hear about them, I'll of course excitedly blog about them, but feel free to add your own ideas/feedback in the comments as well.
In 5.1 you were newly able to send out a full question and answer selection that your students would see in their poll selection window. This made it abundantly clear what the question and answers were even without projecting the panel or sharing it in your Session, but these questions and answers were not preparable before class. This means that anytime you wanted to send out one of the types of polls, you had to take the time to type (or copy/paste) everything in.
For the PowerPoint integration, we combined the best of both worlds by allowing you to insert a new poll object into your notebooks. Now you can prepare full question/answer polls (and even specify them as anonymous for potentially-sensitive discussions) before class. During class, you can send that poll to the students for them to answer by clicking the Launch Poll button on the poll object. This will then send the poll complete with questions and answers to the students for them to answer. In addition, since the poll is part of a panel, the question and answers will be sent to all the students as part of their notes. This will be a big time saver when it comes to creating these custom polls and will more easily allow reuse of polls as they can be copy/pasted between different notebooks or panels.
An interesting consequence of having the prepared poll be an object on a panel is that students can make them as well. Only moderators can actually send the polls to be answered, but students will have the ability to insert a poll object on the panel and then submit that panel to the moderator. Then you, as the moderator, can look at the polls that are submitted, append them to the Session or to a new notebook, and then have the students take the poll by clicking the button.
I remember one of the most interesting exams I ever took in college was the exam where I was tasked with writing my own exam questions and answers. Despite the fact that I clearly knew all the answers to the questions, it may have been the most difficult exam I took. There is a different level of critical thinking necessary to come up with difficult yet not impossible questions about content. For one you are obviously required to know enough about the subject to produce several questions, but more so you have to determine what questions demonstrate an adequate understanding of the subject. This higher-level critical engagement with the content is what makes e-Portfolios such a powerful method of assessment. I think there may be a lot of potential for very exciting uses of this new feature. As I hear about them, I'll of course excitedly blog about them, but feel free to add your own ideas/feedback in the comments as well.
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