Understanding activities: The engine of social learning
In a Makeshapes experience, Activities are more than just "interactions"—they are the bridge between individual reflection and group connection. Traditional digital learning often stops at the screen. In contrast, Makeshapes activities are designed to "warm the social engine," giving every participant a voice before the group discussion begins.
The Design Intent: Why we use Activities
We don't include activities just to keep people busy. Every activity in your experience should serve one of three strategic purposes:
Ensuring "Share of Voice": In many meetings, the loudest person dominates. Activities allow everyone (including the quietest or most junior person) to contribute their thoughts digitally first, ensuring their perspective is visible to the whole group.
Creating "Social Proof": Seeing a word cloud or a poll result helps participants realize, "It’s not just me." This builds psychological safety and validates the group's collective experience.
Active Processing and recall: Moving from "listening" to "doing" helps the brain move information from short-term to long-term memory.
Pro-Tip: The "Activity-to-Discussion" Flow
The most successful designers use the "Think-Share-Talk" model:
Think: Use a Media element to introduce information, ideas or concepts.
Share: Use an Activity to let everyone record their own thoughts.
Talk: Use a Discussion to let the group share and learn together
Activities & Interactions: The Quick Reference Guide
Use this table to understand the purpose of each element in the Makeshapes builder and how it contributes to your experience.
Name | Type | Use when... | Learn More |
Video | Media | You want to deliver expert content, storytelling, or instructions through high-impact visuals. | |
Slideshow | Media | You need to present key information, frameworks, or data in a structured, visual format. | |
Audio | Media | You want to provide distraction-free content so participants can focus on listening. | |
Poll | Activity | You want to quickly visualize group sentiment and surface collective "social proof." | |
Post-its | Activity | You want to capture the expertise of the room through brainstorming and ideation. | |
Word Cloud | Activity | You want to highlight common themes and shared concepts by visualizing repeated keywords. | |
Scales | Activity | You want to safely gauge distribution of opinions, confidence, or agreement across the group. | |
Drawing | Activity | You want to warm the "social engine" with a low-stakes, creative way to share ideas or emotions. | |
Quiz | Activity | You want to reinforce learning through active recall and identify knowledge gaps in real-time. | |
Select | Activity | You want participants to choose a specific preference or option from a set to share. | |
Vote | Activity | You want the group to collectively prioritize ideas or outcomes through democratic voting. | |
Rate | Activity | You want to capture individual scores or ratings on a specific metric. | |
Note | Activity | You want participants to enter personal notes and commitments that can be included in follow-up sequences. | |
Task | Activity | You want participants to complete a task outside of the Makeshapes platform but capture confirmation of completion. | |
Survey | Activity | You need to capture baseline or feedback data to measure the strategic impact of the session. | |
Discussion | Social | You want to provide dedicated time for the group to talk, reflect, and connect over the data shared. | |
Reflection | Individual | You want to prompt participants to think deeply before contributing their thoughts to the group. |
Ready to start building? Check out our our Designing an experience: A Quickstart Guide here.