NOTE May 22, 2019: QBBuzzer appears to be no more. Instead, use BuzzIn.Live. Just as free and even easier to use.
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Yesterday a colleague sent an email to our faculty asking if anyone had buzzers she could borrow for a Jeopardy-like review she was doing in her class. I thought that there must surely be a digital solution.
QBBuzzer is about as easy to use as you can imagine. Visit the QBBuzzer website and choose a name for your “room.” This is what your students will type to get into your room. Keep it simple. (Room names are not case sensitive; spaces are permitted.) Choose a username, like your name. This is what everyone in the room will see.
And this is what it looks like.
Send your students to qbbuzzer.com on a computer, tablet, or phone. Have them type in your room name and then enter their name as their username so you know who buzzed in. Make sure that students type in your room name correctly. If they don’t, they will inadvertently create a new room.
Once all of your students are in, ask your question, and once a student hits the “BUZZ” button, buzzing will be locked for 5 seconds. Here you can see that I buzzed in (“your buzz”), and the lock will automatically clear in 4 seconds. The person who buzzed in can clear the lock by clicking the “CLEAR” button. In the history area, you can see that I buzzed in at 9:34:32.
If someone else buzzes in first, the message says:
Everyone’s screen looks the same as yours so everyone can see who buzzed in; you don’t need to display this on your computer screen.
If you want to make sure that you get at least part of your question asked before someone buzzes in, click “BUZZ” yourself as you start to ask the question. That will buy you 5 seconds before your students have the opportunity to buzz in.
Who created this site?
There is no other information on QBBuzzer website, so I did a little research. The site was created by some people who wanted to practice for Quiz Bowl, but they only had 10 buzzers. They found this pretty limiting given the number of people they had present for practices. They did what any reasonable person would do. They created a buzzer website, QBBuzzer.
Have fun!
