What are Audience Response Tools?

An audience response system is a system of technologies used in real-time or synchronously to quickly receive responses and feedback from an audience. Sometimes also referred to as a personal response system, an audience response system is a set of (typically wireless) devices that allow users in an audience to send their vote, response, or feedback to a central receiver operated by the presenter or instructor. The responses are collected and totaled by the system to provide a summary on a central screen. The results can then be discussed.

What is the purpose of Audience Response Tools?

An audience response system allows a presenter to quickly gather feedback from an audience. Each member can respond to a question, such as a question with multiple choice answers.

The system can be used to determine the audience's general understanding of a topic. Based on the results, the presenter can determine whether to spend more time on the current topic or move on to another. Similarly, the results can change the presenter's focus of the presentation by revealing gaps in the audience's understanding.

Audience response systems can also be used for other purposes, such as evaluation and self-paced quizzing, participation and attendance gathering, and decision making and voting.

An audience response system is particularly efficient with a larger audience where quickly gathering accurate feedback and responses was difficult previously.

How to use Audience Response Tools

Each member of the audience has a response device which allows them to send their responses to the presenter. Depending on the particular response system, the clicker can be a dedicated response device or an existing personal mobile device like a smartphone or laptop. The presenter has a receiver and software that collects these incoming responses and collates them into a summarized view of the data. The presenter chooses whether to display the summarized results back to the audience, which can then be the focus of a discussion, for example.

TurningPoint is Durham College’s preferred and campus-supported audience response or “clicker“ system.