Content
Where do Polls Come From?
Typically, an instructor will provide poll questions as part of their presentation materials.
The polls will have the form:
Poll 01
Question
answer 1
answer 2 (correct answer)
answer 3
answer 4
The CE staff will extract the polls from the submitted presentation materials, create the polls, and save a copy of the polls in the instructor's Unity course folder.
Polls Within Unity
A poll consists of a multiple choice question with two to six possible answers, of which only one can be correct. Polls are sent to all the users within a Unity classroom in the form of a popup window. Each participant can select only a single answer. The poll responses are accumulated until the poll is closed, at which time the poll results are sent into the Unity Conference Room window.
To start, open the POLLING MANAGEMENT window by selecting POLLING from the ADMIN TOOLS pull-down menu.
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Create a Poll
Example of a Polling Management window:
To create a poll:
- Within the Poll List, navigate to the folder where you plan to keep your polls. For more information about Unity folders see Managing Unity Folders.
- Select <Create New Poll> from the Poll List.
- Type a unique poll title into the Poll Title field.
Example: "poll 01 - pie".
We recommend titling polls to reflect both their order and content. For example, if you title three polls as shown below, your polls will be listed in numerical order within the folder and in the order they'll be transmitted during the session. Placing a leading zero in the titles of polls 1 through 9 will assure they are sorted sequentially in the folder. The title will also remind you of the topic of each poll.
01-GFR
02-kidney size
03-anesthesia in renal disease
- Type the poll question into the Question field. The text you input for the question and for each of the answer options will automatically wrap for display on multiple lines; do NOT enter line breaks (with "Enter" key).
Example: "It's time for dessert. Which pie would you prefer?"
- Type the possible answers to the poll question in the fields labelled A through F. Examples: "apple pie", "ollalieberry pie", "chocolate silk pie", and "pecan pie"
- Select the SAVE button. This creates a file in the current folder with the name specified in the Poll Title field. At this point you have successfully created a poll. Please note that you must save the poll again after any edit or change.
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Modify a Poll
To modify an existing poll:
- Left click on a poll from the Poll List. This will cause the poll to open and populate the Poll Title, Question, Possible Answers, Answer (optional), Maximum time for poll (optional), %Participation goal (optional), and Minimum time for poll (optional) fields.
- Select and modify any of the poll fields. In our example, the answer in field B of the Possible Answers was changed from "ollalieberry" to "blackberry", and the Poll Title was modified to "poll 02 - pie".
- When you have finished modifying the poll, select the SAVE button to save your changes. Whenever you modify the Poll Title, this changes file name under which the poll is saved. You will be prompted
Do you want to create a new file instead of renaming the existing file?
Select NO to replace the original poll "poll 01 - pie" with the modified poll "poll 02 - pie".
Select YES to create a new poll file entitled "poll 02 - pie".
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Delete a Poll
To delete a poll:
- Select a poll from the Poll List. The Poll Title, Question, Possible Answers, Answer (optional), Maximum time for poll (optional), %Participation goal (optional), and Minimum time for poll (optional) fields will populate with the values from the selected poll.
- Select the DELETE FILE button.
- When prompted "Are you sure you want to delete this item?" , select the OK button. The poll will be removed from the list of polls, but the poll fields will still be populated. You can clear these fields by selecting <Create New Poll> from the Poll List.
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Send a Poll
To send a poll:
- Select a poll from the Poll List:.
The Poll Title:, Question:, Possible Answers:, Answer:, Maximum time for poll, %Participation goal, and Minimum time for poll fields will populate with the values from the selected poll.
- Typically polls are sent to every user in the classroom. The POLLING MANAGEMENT window can be configured to send the poll to users of a specific level, i.e., Staff, Instructor, Moderator, or Participant. This is done by setting the check box for each level of user to which the poll will be sent. The check boxes are located on the bottom left side of the POLLING MANAGEMENT window and have the following labels:
- Send to Staff
- Send to Instructors
- Send to Moderators
- Send to Participants
- To send the poll, click on the SEND POLL button.
- Immediately after the moderator or instructor sends the poll, the content of the Polling Management window changes to display the poll answer statistics in real-time. It shows the accumulated counts for each answer and the overall number of answers and percent participation for the poll.
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Answer a Poll
Once the poll has been sent, a green text message is displayed in the Conference Room window for all users in the classroom.
Example:
"name sent this poll: question"
Where name is the name of the person sending the poll and question is the poll question.
Each user will receive a Polling window. This window will display the poll question and all of the possible answers for the poll question.
The user clicks on one of the provided answers in the polling window and then selects the SEND button.
Instructors, moderators, and staff can "audit" a poll by closing their polling window without selecting and sending an answer. When a user audits a poll, their response is not included in the accumulated poll statistics.
If a participant user closes their polling window without selecting and sending an answer, they are counted as having not answered the poll.
In the following example, the user has selected answer D: pecan pie.
Once the participant has answered the poll, the Polling window is replaced with a Poll Results window that displays the accumulating poll results in real-time.
The time the participant spent answering the poll is displayed to the right of the poll question in the Poll Results window. In the example below, it took the participant 18 seconds to answer the poll (0:18).
The Poll Results window is automatically closed for all users when the poll is closed.
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Close a Running Poll
A poll can be configured to close automatically when a certain percentage of the participants have answered or when a specified amount of time has elapsed. To learn more about setting automated poll timers, see Set Automated Poll Timers.
Otherwise the moderator must judge when it is best to manually close the poll using the POLLING MANAGEMENT window.
It is unusual for 100 percent of those present in the Conference Room to answer. Moderators do not typically participate, even when they receive the polls. Judge when to end the polling process on the basis of providing a reasonable length of time to answer, rather than waiting for a specific percentage of respondents. However, the percentage provides a good sense of how long it is taking the attending participants to formulate their answers to any given poll.
Once sufficient time has passed or 100% of the users have responded to the poll, the person sending the poll closes it by selecting the CLOSE POLL button from the POLLING MANAGEMENT window. This will:
- Close the Poll Results window for each user.
- Cause the Polling Management content to revert to the list of polls.
- Send a green text message to the Conference Room window of each staff, moderator, and instructor in the classroom indicating the poll has been closed.
Example:
"name closed the poll."
Where name is the name of the person who sent the poll.
- Send the tabulated poll results into the Conference Room window.
Neither an instructor nor a moderator can resend a poll to individual participants who have closed the polling window accidentally, answered incorrectly and wish to change their answer, or have not received the poll. However, when a participant enters Unity while a poll is open, the poll will be displayed in his or her Unity window and can be answered by that participant.
The instructor's warp file can be modified to automatically load, send, and close the polls.
See Use Warp Type Poll Commands.
More often, the moderators handle the sending of polls for the instructor. When this is the case, the instructor needs to cue the moderators in the warp to send each poll. Typically the warp will contain a prompt for the poll:
or
The tilde "~" won't be sent to the Conference Room window and will cause a pause in the automated sending of the warp.
The moderator will react to the poll prompt by sending the specified poll into the Conference Room window.
With automated polls, the warp resumes sending immediately after the poll closes and the automated poll delay, if used, expires. With manually sent polls, the display of the polling results into the Conference Room window is the cue to the instructor to resume sending warp.
It is good practice to follow the display of poll results in the Conference Room window with text in the warp that gives the correct answer to the poll question, provided the poll question HAS a correct answer.
Displaying the correct answer to a poll immediately after the poll closes can be automated using the Answer field in the POLLING MANAGEMENT window.
See Set the Correct Poll Answer.
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Close an Abandoned Poll
If the person who sent the poll is disconnected before the poll is closed, then the poll is considered abandoned.
A green text announcing the abandoned poll is sent to the Conference Room window for each staff, instructor, and moderator user in the Unity classroom.
Example:
The poll sent by name (question) was abandoned because the sender disconnected.
Where name is the name of the person who sent the poll and question is the poll question.
An poll close popup window will be sent to every moderator in the classroom.
Example:
The popup window will allow a moderator (other than the person who sent the poll) to close the poll. Once they close the poll, a green text message will be sent to the Conference Room window for each staff, instructor, and moderator user in the Unity classroom.
Example:
name closed the abandoned poll!
Where name is the name of the person who closed the abandoned poll.
If there aren't any moderators in the classroom, the poll close popup window will be sent to the instructors.
If there are only participants in the classroom when the poll is abandoned then the poll cannot be closed. A moderator or instructor will need to enter the Unity classroom, warn the participants that there was a technical problem and the poll will have to be re-sent. Sending a second poll will override and cancel the abandoned poll.
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Set the Correct Poll Answer
The POLLING MANAGEMENT window has an Answer: field where you can indicate the correct answer to the poll by specifying its letter (A-F). After the poll is sent and closed, text indicating the correct answer will be sent into the Conference Room immediately after the poll results.
To specify the correct answer for a poll, type the letter of the correct answer from the list of possible answers into the Answer: field. Then select the SAVE button.
In the example that follows the answer "A" was chosen as indicated by a purple arrow:
When the poll is closed the text "The correct answer: A" will be automatically displayed into the Conference Room. See below:
Use of the Answer: field is optional.
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Use Automated Poll Timers
A poll timer can be used to automatically close a poll when the specified timing condition is met. There are two types of poll timer: %Participation goal and Maximum time for poll.
- %Participation goal
- This timer is used to specify the desired poll participation percentage. Acceptable values are in the range 1-100. It has an associated Minimum time for poll option.
Minimum time for poll
This option specifies the minimum number of seconds the poll will run, even after the %Participation goal has been met.
For example, if you set the %Participation goal to 90% and the Minimum time for poll to 60 seconds. If the participation goal is met before the 60 seconds has run out, the poll will keep running until the Minimum time for poll has expired.
- Maximum time for poll
- This timer specifies the maximum time in seconds the poll will run.
If both the Maximum time for poll and %Participation goal timers are specified, the poll will close once either of the timers conditions are met.
When a poll is closed because a timer condition is met, a green text message will be displayed into the Conference Room for each staff, moderator, and instructor in the Unity classroom.
Examples:
- %Participation goal is met:
name automatically closed the poll because it reached the participation goal!
- Maximum time for poll is met:
name automatically closed the poll because the maximum time was exceeded!
Where name is the name of the person who closed the poll.
The %Participation goal, Minimum time for poll, and Maximum time for poll fields are located in the bottom right corner of the POLLING MANAGEMENT window. See the image below:
Note the Minimum time for poll field will not appear in the Polling Management window unless a value is first supplied for the %Participation goal field. See below:
If the poll is abandoned (the sender becomes disconnected) then the associated timers are lost. The poll must be closed manually by one of the remaining moderators or instructors. See Close an Abandoned Poll.
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Use Warp Type Poll Commands
Polls can be automatically configured and sent using poll commands within a warp file.
- Load Poll Command (~l~title)
- This is equivalent to opening a poll file and populating the Poll Title, Question, Possible Answers, Answer, Maximum time for poll, %Participation goal, and Minimum time for poll fields.
- Verify Poll Command (~v~title)
- This verifies the poll specified by title has been loaded into the fields of the Polling Management window.
- Set Poll Options Command (~o~max,%participation,min)
- This sets or overides the saved values for the Maximum time for poll, %Participation goal, and Minimum time for poll for the currently loaded poll.
- Send Poll Command (~p~secs)
- This command is equivalent to selecting the SEND POLL button. Once the poll closes, Warp Type will delay secs seconds before it continues sending warp.
The typical warp type text for sending a poll would look like the following:
~l~Poll 01
See Poll 01
~v~Poll 01
~o~60,100,30
~p~4 |
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Poll Text Format
Polls are saved to a text file in poll text format. The poll options (timers) and correct answer specification are also included in the poll text format when the poll is backed up in Unity.
A poll is specified by 4 fields terminated with 3 periods on a line by themselves. For the sake of backwards compatibility, if a poll does not have an options field it may be terminated by 2 periods on a line by themselves
The format is:
- Field 1: The poll title
- This is a single line of text that typically contains the word "Poll" followed by the poll number and a very short, if any, title. It is terminated by a period on a line by itself.
Example:
- Field 2: The poll question
- The poll question can consist of multiple lines of text. It is terminated by a period on a line by itself.
Example:
What animal is or has been your favorite pet?
. |
- Field 3: Options (optional)
- If the poll does not have any options specified, Field 3 will not be part of the poll text format. To indicate a poll has saved options, this field will contain ".OPTIONS" on a line by itself. It will be followed by 4 subfields that are used to specify the poll options. The Options field will be terminated by two periods ("..") on a line by themselves followed by a period on a line by itself.
- Sub-Field 1: Maximum Time
- This is the value of the Maximum time for poll field in the Polling Management window. If the Maximum time for poll option was not specified, this line will be blank.
- Sub-Field 2: Percent Participation
- This is the value of the %Participation goal field in the Polling Management window. If the %Participation goal option was not specified, this line will be blank.
- Sub-Field 3: Minimum Time
- This is the value of the Minimum time for poll field in the Polling Management window. The Minimum time for poll option is only relevant when the %Participation goal option is set. If this option was not specified, this line will be blank.
- Sub-Field 4: Correct Choice
- This is the value of the Answer: field in the Polling Management window. This field is a letter in the range A-F. Any other value will be considered out of range and ignored. If this option was not specified, this line will be blank.
Example:
Maximum Time = 60 seconds
Percent Answered = 90%
Minimum Time = 20 seconds
Correct Choice = A
.OPTIONS
60
.
80
.
20
.
A
..
. |
- Field 4: Possible Answers
- This field contains the 6 values from the Possible Answers: fields of the Polling Management window. The 6 possible answers are separated from each other by a period on a line by itself.
A poll must have at least 2 possible answers. If a possible answer is not used, it will be specified by a blank line.
Each possible answer is composed of one or more lines of text.
Example:
a dog
.
a cat
.
a bird
.
none of the above, but something very extraordinary
.
.
. |
Putting it all together, here is an example of our favorite pet poll in poll text format:
Poll 04 - Favorite pet
.
What animal is or has been your favorite pet?
.
.OPTIONS
60
.
80
.
20
.
A
..
.
a dog
.
a cat
.
a bird
.
none of the above, but something very extraordinary
.
.
... |
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Backup Polls to a Text File
In Unity, polls are stored as separate files within a Unity folder. To backup a set of polls into a single file on your PC:
- Within the Polling Management window, open the Poll text input window by selecting the EDIT POLL button.
Poll text input window:
- Select a poll from the Poll List: field in the Polling Management window, the Poll Title:, Question:, Possible Answers:, correct answer, and poll timer fields in the Polling Management window will populate with the values from the selected poll.
- Select the BACKUP button from the Poll text input window:.
Selecting the BACKUP button will place the poll into the Poll text input window: in poll text format.
Follow the preceding steps for each poll you wish to backup.
- After all the polls have been backed up into the Poll text input window:, left click on the text in the Poll text input window: and a pop-up menu will appear. Click on "Select All."
This will cause all the text in the Poll text input window: to be highlighted.
- Next, left click and select "Copy." This will copy the high-lighted text to your computer clip-board.
- Open up a text editor of your choice (such as MS Notepad or TextEdit) and paste the copied text into the text editor window.
- Using the text editor, save the polls as a text file on your computer.
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Load Polls from a Text File
To load polls from a text file:
- Open the Polling Management window and navigate to the Unity folder where the poll files are to be saved. For more information about Unity folders see Managing Unity Folders.
- Select the EDIT POLL button to open the Poll text input window:.
- Use a text editor (such as MS Notepad or TextEdit) to open the text file on your PC containing the polls in poll text format.
- Copy all the text in the text editor and paste it into the Poll text input window:.
- Select <Create New Poll> from the Poll List: window.
- Select the MOVE button. The poll text for the first poll will be copied into the appropriate boxes in the POLLING MANAGEMENT window.
- Confirm that the poll text is correctly distributed and press the SAVE button.
- MOVE and SAVE each poll until all polls have been saved and the Poll text input window: is empty.
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