Evaluations

Other Formats

Installation

We easily installed Clicker 4 on 14 Apple Macs.  We had a 14 user licence. Although, it can auto load off the network, we manually installed it.

Clicker 4 loads onto the hard drive so the CD-ROM is not required each time. It launches very quickly. The loading and operating instructions in the manual are clear, and in my view, Clicker does not require teachers to have a lot of technical knowledge.

In my opinion, there was a fast speed of response to input by students.

Navigation

The interface is simply designed; it instantly requests the user to choose one of four options on the screen. The Clicker toolbar is very accessible and the students can easily recognise the symbols used, e.g. a speech bubble symbol for the speech option and a house symbol for the home option. We found that it was a very good idea to read the accompanying User’s guide in conjunction with exploring the features of Clicker 4 as guide is clearly laid out.

The students are presented with four options on opening the software.  Our students chose the ‘Start Writing’ option every time.  If students got lost in their task, they found the software quite intuitive to use.  They clicked on the ‘home’ symbol which automatically brought them back to the ‘Start Writing’ screen.

Students can create a folder so their work is locked in until the next lesson. In this way their work is automatically saved. Users can access their work by clicking on Clicker explorer which is a represented by a camera icon. This is the quickest way to access folders.

Clicker 4 has many accessible options that make it suitable for students with special needs. Clicker grids can be operated with either one or two switches.  The built in text to speech option or recordings of voices enable Clicker to be a powerful communication tool. There are a range of switch settings and switch scanning options and Clicker automatically saves these access settings. 

Font size and type can be determined by the student. The supplementary booklet ‘Clicker Access’ provides further information on using Clicker 4 with Special Needs pupils. Clicker 4 does not need a lot of teacher input before students can use it. If teachers brought the package home for one evening with the manual they could easily put together a series of lessons.

I found the on screen help facility to be reasonably good, however, there is so much content on Clicker 4 that it can be time consuming to find the required area. 

Documentation

There is an accompanying User’s Guide with Clicker 4. It is bright and accessible and has illustrations to support explanations. The text is large and the manual is easy to follow. In my view, it is a good idea to familiarise yourself with the guide and software before introducing it to the students.
 
Comprehensive on-screen help is available in addition to a ‘How to use help?’ section.
An on-screen tutorial is available which I found to be worth completing.

There is also a ‘Clicker Training Booklet Series’ available which provides supplementary ideas and activities for use in conjunction with Clicker. There are three booklets available as part of this series; Clicker Introduction, Clicker Advanced and Clicker Access (which focuses on Special Needs learners.) However, these were not purchased or evaluated at this time.