Top Hat Teaching Best Practices

Determine if student response systems are right for your teaching style

Is your main reason for using Top Hat to enhance interactive teaching and learning?
Can you shift the discussion based on the student’s responses to questions?
Are you prepared to devote more class time than usual to questions using the student response system?

Include Top Hat information in your syllabus, so your students know how to access their account.
Share your reasons for using Top Hat to promote engagement in the course

Consider the following questions when drafting your questions:

What student learning goals do I have for the question?
What do I hope to learn about my students by asking this question?
What will my students learn about each other when they see the results of this question?
How might this question be used to engage students with course content in small-group or class-wide discussions?
What distribution of responses do I expect to see from my students?
What might I do if the actual distribution turns out very differently?

Prepare the audience with a warm up question.

These can be simple ice breaker questions or fun trivia related to the course material.
This allows students to check if their response device is working.

Build in one or two minutes for presenting and polling each question and at least 2-3 minutes of discussion.

Never leave a polling slide without responding to the distribution of responses.
Include the students in the discussion of the results. Have them explain why they chose what they did.

Use response questions when the understanding of a concept is critical before proceeding with new content.

Allow class discussion and student questions to clarify the question and any potential ambiguities.
Be prepared to adjust your lecture if students’ answers reveal gaps in knowledge or understanding.

Use a question to wrap-up lectures.

Make connections to related questions and topics, pose “what if” alternative questions for future pondering, and segue into next question.
Use before and after polls to see how students changed their minds after discussion.

Explain to students the course's learning objectives and the reasons behind particular assignments.

Clarify how student response systems will contribute to the class participation.

Use anonymous responses on complex or controversial questions to generate discussion.

Have students respond individually before discussing a question in small groups

Use sound cues to identify the progress of small group discussion: noise rises as they discuss, drops when they reach a resolution, and rises again in small talk.
Re-poll after discussion and compare the results.
Discuss why answers may have changed.

When discussing the results, focus on the reasons behind why an answer is correct and why the others are not.

Have students share their rationale behind why they chose as they did. It gets them critically thinking about why they picked a certain answer.
If the students find a question difficult, have them re-engage with the question in a small group discussion.

If responses are worth points, use Top Hat for a minimal part of the course grade.
Do not grade responses during the first week of class.
Provide timely feedback to students regarding their scores.
Consider awarding participation and correctness separately in responses.