A group of 20 Cathedral College Business Communication and Technology students got some hands-on experience using the Zing Thing technology system at CQU today.

The Zing Thing is a tool used in schools and in business to encourage collaboration and brainstorming.

Jim Callan with students Lizah Clark and Kimberly Pickersgill from TCC

Each student has a keyboard which is linked to a screen at the front of the room, which can be viewed by all students.

The students can participate in open discussion without the others knowing their responses, as all replies are anonymous.

The anonymity encourages students to say what they think without retribution, and also motivates students when they discover their views are shared by other students.

The topic used for The Cathedral College group today was to pick a band for the High School Formal, after a lively debate the students were able to quickly come up with a band based on the most popular vote.

 The session was run by Jim Callan, a marketing lecturer with the Faculty of Business and Informatics at CQU.

Jim Callan has run a successful pilot project with Byfield State School in conjunction with Group Solutions and is keen to introduce the Zing Thing into more high schools.

Please direct any enquiries to j.callan@cqu.edu.au. For more information on Zing Thing and Group Solutions see http://gss.cqu.edu.au.

The workshop under way