Why Use An Audience Response System?

Does a show of hands intimidate your audience?

Do you need to review a large number of questions to prepare your class for finals or credentialing exams?

Do you think your class enrollment is too big to be interactive?

AISR's Audience Response System may be just what you need. An ARS allows your students to participate in lectures by submitting responses to interactive questions using a keypad or other hand-held computer device. These systems include small hand-held units (about the size of a PDA or calculator), a transceiver that collects the responses, and a computer application to organize the results.

Using an ARS can help you better assess how well your students understand the material you're presenting.

• Ask questions of your audience and immediately project a compilation of their responses on a large public screen.
• Tap your audience's feelings, opinions, beliefs, and knowledge--then engage them in a discussion of the results.
• Gauge how well your message is being received, as well as stimulate discussions with your audience on the materials you are presenting.

Audience Response Systems have been popular for CE/CME use for several years and a few journal articles have been written about their use. These articles report that the audience feels more involved in the learning process, finds the presentation more interesting and scores higher on questions asked following presentations using an ARS than the same presentation without it.