by MARK WEST 05/21/10

Mac Tips

Special Keys

You probably call this the "Apple Key", but it's officially called the Command Key and it is located near your spacebar. It is used on a Mac much like the control key is used on Microsoft Windows®; example: control-c on Windows copies and on a Mac we use command-c; control-v pastes on Windows and command-v pastes on Mac OS.

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The Option Key is located near the Command Key and is sometimes called the ALT key. This key can frustrate a Windows user, as it doesn't work as a Windows ALT key does (you'll often use the Command Key on Mac where ALT is used in Windows), such as when tabbing through open applications: on Windows it's ALT-Tab, on a Mac it's Command-Tab.

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The Control Key is located near the Command Key and has special funtions on a Mac (see "Right Clicking" below).

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Exiting A Bad Program

On Windows, Alt+F4 will quickly terminate a program.

On Mac OS, Command+Q will quickly terminate a program.

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The "3-Finger Salute"

On Windows, when a program stops behaving properly, you can press Control+Alt+Delete to invoke the Task Manager to make an application stop.

On Mac OS, you can accomplish the same thing by pressing Command+Option+Escape; this invokes the Force Quit menu and you can make applications stop.

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"Right Clicking"

Sometimes you need to right click. On most computers it's easy, as they come with a two-button mouse. On Mac OS, you typically find a single-button mouse.

You can plug a two-button mouse in to a Mac and it will work. The reason is because two-button mice work on Unix and Mac OS is a Unix variant that uses parts from FreeBSD's and NetBSD's implementation of Unix.

You can also "right click" on a Mac with a single button mouse. To do so, you can do either of the following:

1. Press and hold the Control Key while clicking.
2. (This one only works if you have a Mac with a touchpad - usually a laptop) place two fingers on the touchpad while clicking.

Voting

The video below shows how to create a question in ACTIVInspire as well as how to run the voting session (with ACTIVotes), how to export to Excel and how to allow students to change their votes. All that in 11:52.

The update to ACTIVInspire 1.4.20411 repairs a lot of that which is broken in ACTIVInspire, especially the voting browsers' ability to properly export to Excel. And that's big; no more having to use screen captures to collect your student data (unless you want to).

An Example Question Flipchart

So I went ahead and made up a 10 question quiz based on A joke page about what movies teach us about computers. There are 10 questions and the correct answers are in ALL CAPS. I am using this as an example and if you'd like a copy of the flipchart, you may download it as a reference. Here is the flipchart zipped up in case your web browser messes it up.

Sample Responses

Using classroom response units, I entered answers to 10 questions so that there would be some results to export (and for you to look at if you want a sample of data you can get out of ACTIVInspire). If you would like a copy of the excel sheet, it is here to download

Examining Your Data

The Voting system gives you several ways to display the data, either on the collective whole of what has been output or per question:

Horizontal Bar Graph

This chart indicates results for the preceding question only. Number 23 stopped working on me after the first question, that's why there's not 100% reported here.

Overall Instructor-Paced Scores

This chart indicates results for all questions answered so far. Here are your "grades".

Pie Chart

This chart indicates results for the preceding question only. Interesting to see, but not the view I would first go to.

Summary

This chart indicates results for all questions answered so far. Correct answers are in Green. This gives a display of what the student answered. On question 1, voter 1008 gave an invalid response (pressed D, E, or F on a 3-answer multiple choice question). As you can see, number 1023 had no responses after the first question.

Text Report

This chart indicates results for the preceding question only.

Vertical Bar Graph

This chart indicates results for the preceding question only.

Who Answered What Graph

This chart indicates results for the preceding question only. Time listed is the response time in seconds for each responder. Since this was me, it is not suprising that it took some time for me to move from response unit to response unit.

Who Answered What List

This chart indicates results for the preceding question only.

The Excel sheet available for download, shows you that same data with questions and answers for you to have a summarized text report for your uses.