Recap of Survey Tools Training Using Google Forms and Kobo Toolbox

By : Yuandra Ismiraldi

After much preparation, finally Research Platforms conducted its first training for survey tools in the end September 2014 ! Curious on how the training went ? Read more below :)

So what did we do on the first day ? Acting as a researcher that is trying to collecting data about people opinion of using social media to spread academic literature, the participants of the workshop embark on a journey of using Google Forms to create a web based form that can be used to spread a survey to many people in a fast, efficient, and free way :)

The journey starts by looking what Google Forms can do and how it suits a researcher’s need to conduct surveys to a large number for people that is connected to the internet in an efficient way. Starting from how to manage and create a Google Form using the Google Drive interface, the participants are able to create various types of questions, putting conditional elements inside the form, working together with other people in creating and managing the form results, and trying out various ways to distribute the form such as emails and links (including handy tips such as using an URL shortener).

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With the basic stuff done and the participants have been able to create a Google Form, the workshop then took them up to the next level. We tried several things such as theming a Google Form - changing the background colours and added fun multimedia such as images and videos. We also tried on extending Google Forms via Extension, finding some extension such as mail responder and form limiter and figuring out it various uses for surveys. Last but not least, we played a bit with the new versions of Google Forms Beta - which one of our participants, Artika likes to play around it with its simple and sleek design.

In the second day we say goodbye to the Google Forms and our big laptops and computers and say hello to the uber-ultra smart mini computer in your pocket : your mobile device. Putting the mantle of someone that is trying to do a research regarding building conditions in the university, our workshop participant is presented with a challenge on how they can get various data such as photo, audio, video, and location. The answer ? Using mobile data collection tools such as Kobo Toolbox :)

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Taking the roots from humanitarian operations and based on open source kit called ODK, the tools are supported by the UN and is also available for research usage as well. The participants are first taken to understand the capability of Kobo Toolbox by checking out its features, jumped directly in creating their form, and trying it out by themselves in the real world (if you see some people going around Unimelb pointing their cellphone at buildings, that maybe us).

Afterwards trying out the tool ourselves, we get back and see how Kobo Toolbox can help to analyse the data that we’ve captured by putting it on a nice map. It is a nice feature to get some preliminary analysis of the data, though for more complex data analysis you would like to use more specialised data analysis tools. The second day ended with us exploring advanced features from Kobo Toolbox such as the ability to implement validation function in the form and use XLSF form format to define the form - which resulted in the ability to create multilingual surveys.

Overall, it is an interesting two day session ! Even though the materials were still in alpha, the session went well and there are some interesting feedback that will be used to make the training better next time. Kudos for Christina for attending the training with such diligence and enthusiasm, and for Lachlan for his superb work as a helper in the training !

If you missed the training, don’t worry ! We currently have a second session planned out in 30 November - 1 December 2015 in the University of Melbourne. Book your place here : https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/data-acquisition-using-survey-tools-mobile-apps-registration-19527618633