Aston University
Learn why Daniel Fitzpatrick, lecturer at Aston University, uses Vevox to boost student engagement during small group sessions & whole class discussions.
Aston University
Based in Birmingham city centre, Aston University is a public research University that began as the Birmingham Municipal Technical School in 1895. The school eventually became the UK’s first college of advanced technology in 1956. The University received it’s Royal Charter from Queen Elizabeth II in 1966, and is now home to over 16,000 students.
Daniel Fitzpatrick is a lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Aston, with his research exploring governance and regulation, nationalism and identity, and the politics of sport. Daniel provided a detailed presentation on his use of Vevox in his teaching on one of our most recent Pedagogy Series Webinars.
This customer story will highlight the key details taken from Daniel’s webinar, however if you would like to watch the recorder webinar in full, you can do so by hitting play below!
Vevox is a really efficient tool, both for small group work & for receiving student feedback.
Choosing Vevox
Daniel has experience teaching at all levels of study and his teaching philosophy is that everything starts with engagement. He first came across the idea of audience engagement software around a decade ago, but was initially sceptic as although interested, the most prominent software then was clickers – and Daniel saw clickers as too expensive for the benefit provided.
Over time however, Daniel did begin to experiment with different types of audience engagement software, but Vevox was the one tool he always came back to use more often than not. He found Vevox easy to use and it was simple to apply it within his sessions.
When Daniel was first using Vevox it was mainly sporadically, without much real structure and predominantly to add variety to lessons. It was during the pandemic, when teaching moved online, that he began to think more systematically about how he could use Vevox.
How does Daniel use Vevox in his teaching?
Pre-session for setting expectations
Daniel uses Vevox before the session and runs polls that require individual responses from the whole class – this can be really useful for understanding the knowledge level of students on a topic, or to set clear expectations for the upcoming session.
Icebreaker polls
Wordcloud polls are ran by Daniel at the beginning of a session as an icebreaker – he finds these polls really useful as they immediately set the tone for the session ahead.
Q&A for student feedback
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Daniel uses the Vevox Q&A to allow students to ask questions – and the anonymity is very useful in helping allow students to contribute freely.
Daniel’s Vevox benefits
Daniel really likes how easy to use Vevox is both for lecturers and students, and he has never experienced a situation where students have a lack of understanding on how to use Vevox – highlighting the simplicity and effectiveness of the software.
The adaptability of Vevox has also been useful as it allows Daniel to continually update his teaching material – he finds the software to also be really efficient for small group work, and for receiving valuable student feedback.
If you'd like to hear more about how teaching staff are using Vevox to enhance engagement across an array of teaching styles, read more of our Education Stories here.
