Review of Hot Potatoes

Abstract

The program Hot Potatoes, currently produced by Half-Baked Software, Inc., was designed to allow teachers to make interactive, Web-based exercises that can be accessed by students at any Internet- capable computer terminal with a standard Web browser. Hot Potatoes uses both HTML and JavaScript; however, one does not need to know these languages to make the Web-based exercises. Instead, teachers use the program's exercise templates to create exercises on Web pages which then can be uploaded to a server where students access them. Hot Potatoes can create six different types of Web-based exercises which can stand alone or be linked to other exercises to form a sequence of tasks. Students can correct their own work based on the clues and feedback set up in advance by the teacher. Hot Potatoes also allows the teacher to specify an email address to which scores are sent. Although no knowledge of Web design is necessary to create the Web page exercises, teachers with such knowledge can customize the materials to a greater degree by manipulating the program code.