New quizmaker software: Swency

If you find Kahoot too much hype and over competitive, with too many options that you never use, then there is a start up that has produced a simple down to earth quiz maker. It is web-based, called Swency (https://swency.net).

A great feature is that it is fully multimedia in that you can import images, videos, PDF’s and even upload audio files – which with Kahoot, amazingly, you cannot. Read some exasperated language teachers here!).

Another feature which makes it standout from most modern genre quizzes is that it allows short answer questions. Socrative also does this, but Swency actually marks the answers as well.

Below you can see the automatic feedback to a quiz which was made using Swency. The question about the First Fleet was a straightforward multiple choice question. You can see the student got the date wrong (in red) and the answer is provided. The next question was also multiple choice, but based on a video. The students got the answer correct so it is coloured green. The final question had a picture prompt (not seen in this view) and was a short answer question, which was marked correct. This provides immediate useful feedback to a student.

You can see the teacher’s view below. Green means it was right, red means it was wrong, and the number in the red circle is the option student wrongly selected. But, that isn’t all as here you can see another unique feature of this software. If you click on the red circles you can see the actual answer the student wrongly chose, not just the option number. Very useful if you can’t recall what the wrong option 4 was! And invaluable for the short answer questions. For example, you can see Alan had written Kev instead of Kevin, which is why it was graded as incorrect.

Swency teacher's view
Swency teacher’s view

The software was designed as a simple introduction for teachers to digitising paper tests and adding digital value such as immediate feedback, even for short answer questions. Reflecting that, the question creation page is probably the simplest there is. You have the option to choose an image, a video you have on your computer or one from Youtube, a PDF or an audio file. Or no media file. Then you choose to have 2, 3 or 4 options. Finally, you choose whether your next question will be a multiple choice or short answer question.

Few options – uncomplicated

All the quizzes can be tagged and shared with other teachers in a school or worldwide, as long as the creator allows it. The quizzes are stored on the Swency servers so everything is on the internet, just as with the other web-based quizzes.

For any teachers who want least hassle plus full control over multimedia, this could be an excellent option. Don’t be put off by the slogan of “Digital Workbook” – it is purely quizmaker software.

Disclosure: I was introduced to this software by someone associated with it. I decided it had merits so I have published this review. I have had no inducement to do so, and this review was not shown to the company before I published it.

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