Pear Deck

Engage students using interactive questions during your slideshow lesson. Lessons can be self-paced or live, making this a great tool for in-class or remote instruction. WHS does NOT have a paid subscription for PearDeck, as we have purchased licenses for Nearpod, which has more features and a more robust library. PearDeck does, however, have some great features in the free version.

Link to Lesson Ideas

How to Make Interactive Google Slides with PearDeck


Pear Deck + Google Meet for E-Learning


Remote Instruction SetUp

Remote Instruction: Running a Synchronous Class


Ending Session


Using PearDeck and EdPuzzle Together


Get Started with Pear Deck Slides

Overview

Welcome! This article is for anyone who wants to learn how a Pear Deck Lesson works, from start to finish.

Pear Deck is built to support active learning and empower teachers to hear from every student, every day, in any classroom!

Build your slides from scratch and use Slide Templates

Present your lesson, let students join, and collect responses

1. Present your lesson from the Pear Deck for Google Slides Add-on or the Pear Deck for PowerPoint Online Add-in sidebar by clicking the green Present button. Or, present a lesson from your Pear Deck Home. You can hook your computer to your projector and display your Projector View there (it's optional, but ideal).

When you present on a projector or monitor in front of class, you can show all of the responses to the class. Students get to see what their peers' are thinking, reflect on other points of view, and spark a stimulating class discussion. Responses are anonymous by default on the Projector View, so students don’t have to worry about getting the answer wrong.

2. Your new Session has begun. Each Session contains Join Instructions for students. You can put this screen on the Projector. On their own devices, students go to joinpd.com and enter the five-letter Join Code. Alternatively, you can click Give Students a Link and share the link with students. Depending on your settings, students will then be able to join with their Google or Microsoft Office 365 account, or anonymously. Learn about join options.

3. Now you can run the lesson on your Projector View. Close the Join Instructions. Then, hover over the bottom of the slide go to open the Navigation Bar. Use the controls on the Navigation bar to run the presentation. Your students' screens stay synced with yours. On an interactive slide, students also see the answer input on their screen, which depends on the Interactive Response type you added. Learn more about the five Interactive Questions in Pear Deck.

4. Get insight into individual students' progress by opening the private Teacher Dashboard, a Premium feature. The Dashboard View syncs up to the Projector View, so you can use it to control the presentation on a separate device. You can see who’s stuck or confused, and even click on the stars to automatically highlight or hide good examples or misconceptions on the Projector View.

By comparison, here's how the same answers display, anonymously, on the Projector View:

Extend the lesson with homework and review

Sometimes you don’t make it through the whole lesson during class. Other times, students are absent and need to work through the lesson on their own. Or, you may want students to go back for review. When you need to extend your Pear Deck Lesson beyond class time, here are two great options for you:

  1. Turn on Student-Paced Mode

  2. This is especially helpful when you didn’t complete the lesson or students were absent from class. Student-Paced Mode lets students navigate through the slides at their own pace and respond to all of the Interactive Slides. Later, their answers can be viewed by reopening the Projector and Dashboard Views, so you can talk about their answers the next day in class.

  3. Publish Student Takeaways™ (a Premium feature, available when you log in with Google)

  4. When the Session is over, you can give each student personalized notes. This is best when you want students to review all the content from the lesson and reflect on their own answers. Since a Takeaway™ is a Google Doc, you can easily share it with parents or tutors when a student needs help at home.

Review responses later

When the Session is over, there are more ways to review and provide feedback to your students.

  1. Export students' answers to a Google Sheet (available when you log in with Google)

  2. This is great if you made a quiz and/or need to score Multiple Choice or Text responses. You can even use the Google Sheets Add-on Flubaroo to automatically grade the quiz and send grade reports to students.

  3. Review Answers in the Teacher Dashboard (a Premium feature)

  4. This helps when you want to flip through the lesson slide-by-slide and see what each student said and what material might need to be revisited the next day.

We have completed our overview of Pear Deck Slides! To start creating and presenting new Decks now, install the Pear Deck for Online PowerPoint Add-in or the Pear Deck for Google Slides Add-on. Create new Custom Interactive Slides, then try adding a warm-up question, activity, exit ticket, or critical thinking slide from the Slide Library!

Do you have more questions about getting started? Email help@peardeck.com!

Additional Resources

PearDeck Tutorials

Student-Paced Lesson Tutorials: Let students go through the Google Slides at their own pace, on their own time, responding to questions or prompts.

Student Paced Lessons - Step by Step

Student Paced PearDeck - Quick How-To