Preparing for GCSEs is no easy feat, especially when it comes to motivating teenagers to study.
As anyone who works with teenagers knows, intrinsic rewards are often not enough. Even extrinsic rewards, such as a good GCSE grade, can elude them. Despite our best efforts to emphasise the importance of consistent study habits, many students only realise the need to buckle down when it’s almost too late.
For GCSE languages, as with most subjects, success hinges on the grind of memorisation and practice. Repetition is key. However, it’s not easy, it’s not sexy, but it is very straightforward. It’s also very boring for teenagers–or indeed for anyone– but I refer you back to my earlier comments regarding intrinsic rewards.
So how, then, to get them to do the memorisation of the approximately 2,700 items of vocabulary they need for the average languages GCSE, (and that’s not including the verb endings they need to be able to recognise effectively)?
This is where Quizizz comes in, offering a solution that combines learning with fun and extrinsic rewards. Quizizz transforms dry, repetitive tasks into engaging activities. It never ceases to amaze me how a lesson filled with monotonous exam practice can be completely turned around by adding just 10 minutes of Quizizz at the end. Suddenly, what they see as a boring lesson becomes fun and, more importantly, effective.
It also means you can leave the passive vocabulary learning to this part of the lesson, allowing you to focus on exam practice and strategies, as well as productive skills during the rest of the lesson.
As we approach the listening and reading exams, I increase the amount of time spent on vocabulary. I have found that you can include huge amounts of vocabulary, especially with Quizizz Pro, using match and categorising questions, to name a few. Students do not tire, even with 80+ questions, buoyed by the extrinsic rewards of beating friends, the leaderboard, and of course “Strike and Shield”.
So, what to include?
To make the most of Quizizz, I like to go through past papers and find the highest frequency terms, and of course, those that we know students struggle with.
Something I find particularly useful, especially with less confident students, is to take a past paper (ideally one they did a while ago) and to put the vocabulary into Quizizz. Do a few sessions (or a couple of very long sessions - 30 -40 minutes will fly by for them) and then give them the exam (listening or reading). They will find that they do well and that practicing the vocabulary helped them. This demonstrates to them that memorising the vocabulary does help. This is best done with some time to go until the exams to give them time to apply their new, informed enthusiasm for vocabulary learning.
From there, the power of Quizizz in my classroom was born. Students actively engaged in a variety of business topics, and the multiple-choice questions allowed me to replicate the exam format. For the students, it brought a competitive element into the classroom, and for me, the reports function allowed for active monitoring of any misconceptions at both class and individual levels. These misconceptions became starters for the next lesson, saving me hours of trawling through students' books.
After a term and a half of regularly embedding Quizizz into each topic area, Year 11 managed to scrape a 33% pass rate – an improvement on the previous year’s 6% before I arrived. The following academic year, Year 10 improved that pass rate to 53%. Quizizz played a significant role in that improvement. There was still work to do to ensure that the Business Curriculum scored as highly as other optional subjects.
Unfortunately, lockdown struck, bringing a whole new raft of problems. Lessons moved online, students didn’t attend regularly, and I was never convinced that those who showed as present were actually there! After six online lessons, on average each student had completed two of the six topics, but not the same two!
Looking for answers brought me back to Quizizz, this time to the new “Lessons” offering. I liked the idea that I could lead a lesson, but more importantly, it allowed students to participate in guided learning during lockdown. I saw the use of my dwindling capitation as an investment and opted to go “Premium,” which allowed me to embed media clips. With the help of a talented Associate Teacher, Quizizz lessons were implemented into our online teaching repertoire. This allowed us to dictate which student did which lesson and gave us a report of their progress, highlighting anything incomplete and, of course, those dreaded misconceptions.
Students eventually returned to the classroom, and the Year 9 who had been potentially missing in action during the formative months of their Business Education were now in Year 11, preparing for a live exam. During a chat about revision strategies, one particularly academically challenged individual piped up, “What about those Quizizz lessons we used in Lockdown?” Yes, what a fantastic idea!
Once again, Quizizz to the rescue — a revision platform that engaged students and provided me with reports on who had completed what revision, highlighting areas needing more work.
More lessons were quickly written. It takes me about 30 minutes to write a decent revision offering containing an opening quiz slide, up to three theory slides, a media clip followed by a series of questions to check for understanding, and at the student's own suggestion, a couple of practice exam questions.
The reporting feature allows me to manage which topics have been covered by which students and to quickly step in to provide additional support where needed. The introduction of Artificial Intelligence (AI) into Quizizz has made the process significantly quicker and it even lets you choose the age of students it is suitable for, another time saver for teachers!
My results last year were the highest ever, with a 91% pass rate. Quizizz significantly contributed to this success by engaging students throughout their three years of studying for their Business and Enterprise Qualifications. It also saved me and my associate teachers time, allowing us to intervene more quickly and effectively than using traditional methods.
As I continue to grow the Business Education provision within the school, we’ve moved from the one original group of 28 students when I arrived at the school to at least 3 groups in each year. Growing demand has led us to offer a Level 3 Business Course to our 6th form. Despite their maturity, they love nothing more than a cheeky game of Quizizz. Shouting out the wrong answers to confuse their classmates has become the new norm in my classroom. It's now hard to remember my luddite days; Quizizz has not only improved my exam results but also turned Business Education into one of the most popular subjects in the school.
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