Great for on the fly polling of student understanding.
Community Review for Socrative
My Take
Easy to use. Students need internet devices (from smartphone to computer). Teacher can easily set-up an account and as a question right away. Allows for all students to have a voice in the class conversation. Teacher can make sure that every student is heard and can get a true test of what the class knows. I like that the questions/answers can be anonymous or can require a name. I also like the vote on answers option. I like to use this to have students discuss answers and they see that I am not the source of the answer and that sometimes there are degrees to answers. I like that I can add pictures to questions. This facilitates using this for vocabulary in the Foreign Language class and with ELs.
How I Use It
I use it to see what my students already know, to test if they understand my lecture, to gather opinion, to vote on ideas or choices, to give quick quizzes. I also use it as a review tool so my students can review content with the space race game feature of Socrative. I make up pre-questions/quizzes based on the content of my lessons. I also use this to ask questions as they come up in the class. I find that my students like that they can answer without having to raise their hands. I like to see what they think and I look at the results in class to group my students or to extend discussion by asking students why they answered a certain way.