Getting started with activities in Poll Everywhere

Poll Everywhere is a versatile option for encouraging engagement in your courses. Use it to present general polls, attendance items, review questions, quizzes, and more; students respond by following links to your activities in a web browser or app on their computers or mobile devices. Results are received and updated instantly and can be displayed at your discretion to generate reflection and discussion.

The steps below will guide you through creating your account in Poll Everywhere, importing your course roster, and creating your activities. Once you’re up and running, Poll Everywhere’s Essential Distance Learning Guide provides a great overview of many key features. And of course, you can always contact us with any questions or comments that pop up as you get started—we’d love to hear from you.

Step 1: Create your account in Poll Everywhere

Creating an account in Poll Everywhere is quick and easy. Because you sign in with NetBadge, there’s no hassle of creating yet another username and password combination.

1. Visit polleverywhere.com, and select the Log in link at the top of the page.
2. Enter your UVA email address (computing ID@virginia.edu) into the box, then select the Next button.
3. Select the Log in with UVA NetBadge button, then sign in with NetBadge.
4. Select the Sign up for my Poll Everywhere account button. Your account has now been created!

If you previously created a free account with Poll Everywhere using your UVA email address, we’ll need to invite you to join the UVA account in Poll Everywhere. Send us a message at learningtech@virginia.edu and we’ll take it from there!

Step 2: Import your course roster into Poll Everywhere

Now that you’ve created your account in Poll Everywhere, you can import your course roster, which registers your students as participants for your activities and allows you to review their responses and export them to your gradebook. If you’re using Poll Everywhere for basic engagement and you don’t need these features, you can skip to Step 3 below.

1. Visit your course site. If you’re using Collab, you can follow the steps for adding tools to sites to add the Poll Everywhere tool to your site. If you’re using Blackboard or Canvas, you may need to contact your system administrator to make sure you have access to the tool.
2. Access the tool in your course site. If you’re using Collab, you can select Poll Everywhere in the toolbar on the left side of the page in your site. If you’re using Blackboard or Canvas, you can follow the steps in the Blackboard and Canvas educator guides to access the tool.
3. If you see a Continue to LMS to login button, such as Continue to collab.its.virginia.edu, select it to continue the process.
4. Select the Import Roster button.
5. Select the Go to Participants page button. Your participants will be listed on the page, and your course roster will be listed among the Groups on the right side of the page.

If new students are added to the course roster after you import it into Poll Everywhere, you’ll need to repeat the roster import process to add them to your group in Poll Everywhere.

Step 3: Create your activities

Now that the setup is out of the way, you’re ready to get started with Poll Everywhere!

1. Visit polleverywhere.com and sign into your account.
2. Select the Create button.
3. Follow the steps for creating activities to create your activity, then activate it when you’re ready for your students to respond. You can even insert your activities directly into your PowerPoint, Keynote, or Google Slides presentation!

By default, newly created activities are restricted to registered participants, which requires students to be registered with you (through their inclusion on a course roster you imported into Poll Everywhere) and signed into Poll Everywhere with NetBadge in order to respond. However, you can change this setting and make your activity accessible to everyone who visits the activity link by visiting the Configuration menu.