Presenters: Caitlin Carter

One of the most difficult tasks while teaching undergraduate students is maintaining audience engagement. Historically, clickers have been used to encourage student participation and to gauge comprehension during lectures. However, using clickers has some disadvantages, which has allowed for more robust audience response systems to gain popularity within higher education institutions. Top Hat, an audience response system, is a subscription web-based product which can be used to keep students engaged in the learning process. In January 2016, the School of Pharmacy decided to pilot the use of Top Hat in all first-year courses, due to its versatility. This lightning talk will describe how 2 librarians used Top Hat in a first-year drug information course to deliver more interactive lectures. Top Hat’s variety of question types, like word answer, click-on-target, and multiple choice, were used to assess student learning and to gather feedback. Top Hat has a low learning curve, but it does require some time investment when creating questions. Anecdotal feedback from students has been positive, and Top Hat has been embraced by instructors at the School of Pharmacy, while continuing to grow in popularity. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5596/c17-018