Yeas and Nays: Using Smartphones for Gathering Data

By Alex Lussier, Laura King and Alice Havel , Adaptech Research Network

At a Glance

Discipline

Interdisciplinary

Instructional Level

College & CEGEP

Tasks in Workflow

Social Plane(s)

Individual

Type of Tasks

Collecting & seeking information
Analyzing
Reading
Writing

Technical Details

Useful Technologies

Smartphone (iOS or Android)
Google Suite or Microsoft Suite
Tableau, PollEverywhere, Quizziz or Kahoot

Class size

Small (20-49)

Time

Multiple class periods (2-3 classes)

Instructional Purpose

Application & knowledge building
Consolidation & metacognition

Overview

The overall aim of this activity is to help students learn new, efficient and flexible ways to collect a variety of datasets (qualitative, quantitative, statistical).

During this activity, students will be invited to create an online data-gathering tool using their preferred online platform (Kahoot, Quizziz, PollEverywhere, Google Form, etc.). They will then have to use their tool to gather data. They will be asked to vary the types of questions so as to learn how to gather and interpret different types of data. The general purpose of the activity is to allow students to experience different data gathering techniques through a variety of smartphone apps.

We are grateful to the Entente Canada-Quebec for funding this project.

Instructional Objectives

Students will be able to identify different ways of gathering different kinds of data
Students will be able to familiarize themselves with different data-gathering tools that are compatible with smartphones
Students will be able to explain privacy concerns and the importance of participant consent

Workflow & Materials

Activity Workflow

View on CourseFlow

Document

Teacher Resources

Alex Lussier, Laura King, Alice Havel

Contributor's Notes

Benefits

The students find data-gathering more engaging and less time-consuming when carried out using technology, especially on smartphones

Challenges

It can be challenging to find data-gathering tools which maintain high privacy-protection standards

Tips

Ensure that students are aware of the privacy concerns that participants may have
Allow for class time for students to learn to use the data-gathering tool and ensure that it is usable with their smartphone

Applied Strategies

Project-Based Instruction

Analytical skills and knowledge management

Case Studies

Real-life scenarios

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Published: 08/06/2020

Copyright: © 2025 Lussier, King and Havel. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication on this website is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.