This feature acts as a poll, enabling you to ask your learners a single question and offer a selection of possible responses. It is better suited to a tutor-supported course.

It can be used to:

• stimulate thinking about a topic
• quickly test your learners’ understanding
• facilitate your learners’ decision-making, for example by allowing them to vote on a direction for the course. 

Results may be published – anonymously, if preferred – after learners have answered, or after a certain date, or not at all.

To manage a workshop in your course you will need to have either the Course Manager or Teacher role. To gain these roles you would need to complete a data declaration form – please contact openlearncreate@open.ac.uk to request one.

To add a poll, switch editing on, go to your course’s homepage and click on the + Add an activity or resource button.

This will give you a screen full of options. Click on the Choice icon to open the New Choice page.

Enter the name for the poll and (if you require one) a short description of it in the Name and Description fields. If you want this description to appear on your course homepage just below the link to the poll, you can tick the Display description on main page tickbox.

The Display mode for the options drop-down list sets whether the options are listed horizontally (i.e. on a line) or vertically (i.e. in a list).

There’s a variety of settings for creating a poll, each with a help icon that includes more information.

• Options includes settings for whether a choice that a learner makes can be updated, whether more than one choice to be selected, or whether only a certain number of learners can respond. There are also fields to add the options (Option 1, Option 2, etc.), and you can add more, if required.
• Availability enables you to select a specific time period for the poll to be available; alternatively, if you do not adjust these settings then the poll will remain open.
• Results relates to whether learners see the results of the poll after they’ve responded to it. 

Click the Save and display button.

Go to the Administration block on the left-hand side of the screen and click on Responses to view or download your learners’ responses. (You can also delete some or all of the responses)