Interactive Whiteboard use in the classroom

I have agreed to learn alongside a colleague who has had an interactive whiteboard installed in her class. As I don't have my own class to learn in... she has kindly allowed me to learn about the use of them with her.
My one big concern is that this tool is predominantly used in whole class situations. It has been found in the UK that

that it is precisely because the IWB is so suited to supporting whole-class teaching that it has been adopted so rapidly in comparison with more personal technologies which integrate less readily into traditional teaching  methods. This may lead to the technology merely being used to reinforce current teaching approaches (Hall & Higgins, 2005), rather than supporting a transforming pedagogy.

Now to research what to use it for, how to implement it to the best benefit of the children (avoiding predominant use in whole class situations) and when to use them!

How do we use IWB as an effective tool to engage students?


- provide an initial structure for teaching
- save time scribing
- provide a large display that children could see and read easily
- demonstrate skills for children
- attract and retain children’s attention
- provide images or text that children can not easily have had access to in other ways
- engage them in quizzes or tests within the whole-class environment
- increase class participation by children writing their solutions on the board.
- save work so that the teacher and class can access their joint contributions at a later stage
- provide a tool for children to create their own multimedia screens for class presentations
- enable collaborative workprovide images that could later be adjusted by children to display their own work
- foster independent thinking skills in children and improve their cognitive skills.
(Cogill, 2004)

An illustrated collection of ideas can be found at
http://ferl.becta.org.uk/display.cfm?resID=8224

What are some effective strategies for implementing in classes?


IWB's have been shown to have an enormous impact in classrooms.

they have the potential to enhance demonstration and modelling; to improve the quality of interactions and teacher assessment through the promotion of effective questioning; to redress the balance of making resources and planning for teaching; to increase the pace and depth of learning (Becta, 2004)

How can we use IWBs to deliberately engage learners in small group situations?

Expert teachers create, collect, adapt and use (or construct with students) dynamic, manipulable objects of joint reference on the IWB which thereby  offers new forms of support for intersubjectivity. These objects support the setting of challenges, building representations, evaluation of ideas, speculation, appropriation of student ideas into descriptions of formal knowledge, and student independence (Hennessy et al.).

It seems that IWBs could be highly supportive of increased interaction with shared ideas, thinking out loud through the highlighting, interpreting or explaining and changing content as a lesson progresses. As with any other classroom resource, what a teacher does with an IWB is much more important than the tool itself. Professional development in the provision of IWBs is also really important in ensuring that the biggest benefit is gained from such an expensive investment.