Fostering Student Engagement: The Impact of Pear Deck in a New Education Landscape

By Valentina Sorbera, William & Mary

DOI: https://www.doi.org/10.69732/URBN3444 

Numerous studies have shown that using technology helps keep students engaged in the classroom. The Engagement Theory affirms that “students must be meaningfully engaged in learning activities through interaction with others and worthwhile tasks. While, in principle, such engagement could occur without the use of technology, we believe that technology can facilitate engagement in ways which are difficult to achieve otherwise” (Kearsley and Shneiderman, 1998). Although Engagement Theory is a two-decade old concept, I find it still very current and relevant in today’s education landscape, especially if we consider the challenges with student learning and engagement that arose during the COVID-19 pandemic and that persist to the present day. 

As educators, we struggled during the pandemic years to find new strategies to conduct our classes in an interactive way. The biggest challenge for me was staring at a wall of little black boxes with students’ names on them, waiting for a sign of life from at least one of them. What are my students doing right now? Are they listening to me or to their favorite song? Are they even in the virtual classroom? Are they just staring at their wall? Or staring at the black boxes like me?

Of course, asking students to turn on their webcams presented several privacy issues, so I had to quickly give up on this requirement. Actually, the main problem was not understanding if they were in the room, because I could see that little green dot showing their presence in my virtual classroom. My biggest concern was understanding if they were working on class material and what their actual engagement level was. 

That’s when I started investigating different technological tools to make students active participants in the learning process. I was already familiar with some classroom response systems like Kahoot (a game-based quiz platform), and I had used them before in my in-person classes. But I was looking for something that would allow me to keep students engaged in a meaningful way, to check their presence in real time in the virtual classroom, facilitate class interaction, and have them share their feelings and thoughts with their peers. Among all of these tools, I found success in the use of Pear Deck. 

Pear Deck is one of the many classroom response systems (sometimes called a personal response system, student response system, or audience response system), that helps to facilitate classroom activities and discussions. It is a Google Slides Add-On (an extension to Google Slides meant to enhance a presentation) that allows students to interact with Google Slides presentations and get direct feedback from the instructor. Add-Ons help to elevate class discussions and students’ engagement, and Pear Deck provides this affordance.

The Potential of an Interactive Log-in for Warm-Up Activities

Even the logging in process is engaging. Students are prompted to join by entering a code on joinpd.com and the code always contains some kind of silly joke or phrase. In my in-person classes students get involved in the learning process right away: in a beginner language class I ask them to read aloud the spelling in Italian of the code, to say in Italian “start class”! (cominciamo la classe!) and I can even review numbers, by asking how many students are connected (quanti studenti sono connessi?). I always ask them to double check if the Pear Deck number of students connected matches the number of students in the class. This is a fun way to check who is really participating and paying attention. As we progress in the semester, I ask them first to come up with some random words starting with the letters (>) of the code, and progressively to elaborate an original sentence in Italian with the letters, up to the final goal of translating the silly Pear Deck quotation. 

I started using these warm-up activities with my online students during the pandemic. For the code activity, I would prompt them to turn on their microphones and raise their virtual hands to spell out the letters. Then I encouraged them to find words starting with those letters and post a picture of them in the common chat. For the number portion of the warm-up, I asked them to write out numbers in words in the common chat, or to turn on their microphones and say the numbers out loud. 

The fact that I was able to implement these warm-up activities both online and in person effectively demonstrates how Pear Deck can be considered an adaptive tool for different teaching styles, as well as ever-changing educational landscapes.

Bridging the Gap Between Online and Face-to-Face Teaching

Once I went back to face-to-face teaching, I thought that I could leave technology behind, without considering how much these years of online learning shaped a new generation of students and us educators as well. To continue keeping my students engaged, I had to find a middle ground between online and in-person instruction, and the use of Pear Deck addressed this need.

From my experience, Pear Deck helps students take notes, review them after class, stay on task during class time, and get direct feedback from the instructor both during and after class. I have been using Pear Deck since Spring 2020, validating that students love it both in an online setting as well as in-person, since they can experience first hand its effectiveness and ease of use. 

Students appreciate Pear Deck because it makes the class more interactive, making it easier to stay engaged. It allows them to practice writing in Italian and see anonymously how other classmates respond, helping them stay focused and active in the classroom, while reinforcing the material presented by the professor. Moreover, it keeps them accountable, but in a fun way compared to a standard lecture. Pear Deck slides are colorful and creatively designed, which students find appealing. In addition, unlike standard lectures where the professor is the protagonist, Pear Deck promotes a collaborative learning environment. It facilitates communications between the students and the professor and empowers students. The Teacher Dashboard feature, which I will describe later in this article, ensures accountability as well by allowing the instructor to check students’ participation. 

An Essential Technological Resource for Instructors

Pear Deck is not only helpful for students, but for instructors as well. It can be easily used to create a formative assessment, since it allows quick checks on main course objectives. For instance, during a review session of paste tenses in Italian, I used the multiple-choice function as an exit ticket.

After a few seconds, I was able to show my students’ answers and those who answered incorrectly quickly shifted to the correct answer.

Students love getting instant feedback, both from the instructor and their peers in the classroom, confirming that this tool fosters collaborative learning. Receiving immediate feedback from the teacher and being able to discuss as a class other students’ responses enable students to work on their mistakes and demonstrate their progress in a constructive way but without stigmatizing anyone. Immediate feedback helps students stay more engaged not only in the class but also it improves their overall performance, since it allows them to correct their initial incorrect answers without having to wait (delayed feedback), risking repeating the same mistake. Furthermore, it deepens their understanding of the material, by showing both the correct answer and the incorrect answers, fostering deepened learning through collaboration with their peers (Opitz, B., Ferdin, N. K., & Mecklinger, A. 2011).

In addition to allowing immediate feedback, Pear Deck also provides the option of giving feedback after class. That’s when I review students’ responses individually through the “Reflect and Review”, a link automatically generated by Pear Deck once the class session is closed. This is a feature to provide students with additional support, and to further improve their understanding of the material. I encourage students to use the Reflect and Review links to review before a quiz or an exam. Through this link, students can review the slides, their answers, as well as the instructor feedback. However, this feature does not allow student editing, but you can always reopen the session in Student-Paced mode to allow them to make changes if you like.

Creating a Pear Deck Lesson

Another plus of Pear Deck is that it’s not one of those time-consuming technological tools: you won’t have to revolutionize your presentations or lesson plan, you will just enhance them by adding Pear Deck from the Add-ons option in your Google Slides. 

You can either design a new presentation or open an existing one in Google Slides, or even simply upload your PowerPoint presentations to Google Slides and add the Pear Deck extension to them. In my Italian language classes I use mostly the Text, Drawing, and Multiple Choice options, and sometimes I use the Draggable option. Drawing and Draggable are available only with Premium plans (currently $149.99/year or $17.99/month).

If you are not feeling creative or you are really in a rush to prepare your lesson, Pear Deck can actually save you time in planning, since you can find several templates on the right sidebar. These templates support learning during the different phases of a lesson: the beginning of the lesson, during the lesson and at the end of the lesson. You may also find templates related to learning development, some designed to foster critical thinking as well as social-emotional learning, or other templates specific to subject areas. Templates can be modified and you can also create your own custom activity or question from scratch. 

“Generate Instant Pear Deck” is a new feature which allows you to add AI-generated content: “Rapidly create a Pear Deck lesson tailored to your curriculum by specifying a topic/standard, linking to helpful resources, or using your own materials” (from the Pear Deck website).

It gives several options such as choosing the desired grade level or selecting the lesson type: it can plan a full lesson by incorporating teaching, practice and quick assessment, or focus on a single learning objective or just exit tickets to review class material. All the content created using this feature is customizable and downloadable on your Google Drive. 

Certified Content is a collection of standards-aligned customizable Pear Deck lessons, but unfortunately there is not a collection for world languages as of the writing of this article.

Another advantage of Pear Deck is that it lets you add audio to your slides. One way you can use this is to leave instructions for your students, making Pear Deck not only a tool to be used in synchronous class but for asynchronous learning as well. I never used this option during my lockdown classes, since I always preferred to meet my students synchronously, but this semester I had an emergency, and the audio option helped me create a fun and engaging lesson quickly.

Not only was I able to use the Pear Deck activities, but I could give my students direct instructions on class material, right from Pear Deck. The advantage was that I only had to use one tool to record my lecture, assign in class activities, and provide feedback. It was very easy to add audio to my existing presentation and I didn’t have to change my lesson plan on the fly or cancel class. Feedback from students about the class was very positive. One of them commented: “it was very helpful to listen to your little voice while completing our activities.” 

Additionally, I could check their attendance, class participation metrics, and their comprehension of class material from the Teacher Dashboard, and to me, this is the best Pear Deck feature (but keep in mind that it is only available with a Premium membership). The Teacher Dashboard shows students answers with their names and allows the instructor to provide direct feedback. 

Finally, I am not wondering any more what my actual students (or any other little black box with a name on it) is doing during my class!

Once you have created your lesson and embedded any audio, there are two modes of presentation: student-paced and instructor-paced, so you can either control the pace of the lesson, or make the students work independently on it. The student-paced mode works great for asynchronous online teaching as well as for homework assignments. In class, I usually like to use the instructor-paced mode, unless I decide to have students work on several activities in class at their own pace. During an instructor-paced session in person I can show students’ answers anonymously to the whole class, and ask them to help each other correct their mistakes. This feature helps students come out of their comfort zone without being singled out. It makes the class flow with ease, fostering a collaborative learning environment, making it easier for students to accept their own mistakes and learn from them, rather than feeling punished and intimidated.

Conclusion

Pear Deck is indeed a useful technology solution which helps foster student engagement both in an online setting as well as in person, and beyond this, it can be considered a “bridge” between the two modes of teaching. My experience has shown that students’ reactions to the use of this tool have all been very enthusiastic. They find it helpful, fun, engaging, and it helps them demonstrate their progress in the classroom, as well as participate in a more meaningful way without worrying about making mistakes in front of the class. It is a constructive way of learning, by encouraging students to collaborate and learn from each other. Pear Deck is very useful for instructors as well, making it easier to plan a lesson both online and in person. It helps check students’ participation and attendance, quickly assess their performance and provide instant feedback. It’s just simply fun and easy, and I hope that many of you will consider integrating this technology into your classroom.

References

Anggoro, K. J. (2021). Pear Deck. RELC Journal, 52(3), 645–647. https://doi.org/10.1177/0033688220936735

Kearsley, G., & Shneiderman, B. (1998). Engagement theory: A framework for technology-based teaching and learning. Educational Technology, 38(5), 20–23. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44428478

Javed, Y., & Odhabi, H. (2018) Active learning in classrooms using online tools: Evaluating Pear-Deck for students’ engagement. Proceedings of the 2018 Fifth HCT Information Technology Trends Conference (pp. 126-131). ITT. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/8649515

Oded, I., & Oded, Y. (2022). Pear Deck. CALICO Journal, 39(3), 383. https://doi.org/10.1558/cj.18575

Opitz, B., Ferdin, N. K., & Mecklinger, A. (2011). Timing matters: The impact of immediate and delayed feedback on artificial language learning. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 5(FEBRUARY), 8–8.  https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2011.00008

Spasova, S. D. (2018). Pear Deck for student participation. The FLTMAG. https://fltmag.com/pear-deck-for-student-participation/

Zarina H. (2021). Improving students’ participation using Pear Deck during the Covid-19 pandemic, in Rovena Elaine Capel Quah Seok Hoon (Eds.), Proceedings of the 2021 International E-Learning and Technology Conference (pp. 59-65). PELLTA. https://pellta.org/uploads/8/1/8/9/81899300/ielt-con2021_proceedings.pdf#page=59