Not exactly no Scott - remember two grand is for the package.  An IWB set-up consists of three parts - the board itself, a computer and a projector.  Don't forget laptops and projectors cost money too!  SMART boards themselves are now starting at around £700 (http://tinyurl.com/3c2oy7).  And of course give it another few years and they'll come down to an even more accessible price.  Maintenance costs are the same for both set-ups, most notably the price of the bulb replacement in the projector.  The life of an IWB - there's nothing to break really!  I dare to suggest at the minimum, a board would last ten years, making that about £70 a year.  Not bad considering the price of other resources schools are faced with.

As for your comment that 90% of IWB activities can be replicated with a laptop and projector, I have to question the reliability of your source and wonder if they have fully exhausted the potential of IWB usage in the classroom - perhaps you could forward the reference or research?  I think your source is very brave to make such a sweeping statement when the pedagogy is still in its infancy.  There are a huge range of "interactive" uses of the board that are not possible using just a laptop.  Picture the two teams lining up to race to shoot the correct phoneme (http://tinyurl.com/66k4ez) , with two browsers open racing to select the correct business collocation (http://tinyurl.com/24wsy4) or matching the British English to NZ English (http://tinyurl.com/cn4yhl).  This is just the beginning in ELT and now that everyone is the world can be a materials writer, who knows what kind of great resources we will have to use in five years time.  You just need to look at the UK primary and secondary school sector to see the range of collaborative material that has been built up.

However, one of the biggest advantages of the IWB over a laptop/DP set-up is the ease of access - the ready to go nature of the board.  I believe for technology to be used successfully, it is necessary to remove as many barriers to use as possible and one of them is setting up all the equipment in your class.  You would be amazed at the lack of confidence many of the teachers I train have when it comes to simply plugging things in.  And with the other pressures of teaching, who wants to worry where the VGA lead is and how to switch the display on the laptop to dual view.  I've seen many new shiny laptops and projectors collecting dust in the cupboard because teachers simply can't be bothered.  IWBs are ready to go - all you have to do is switch on the computer and you're away making it far more accessible and more likely for teachers to make the most of the wealth of material there is available.

I'd love to hear from anyone else who has had experience with IWBs.

Richard

"There are a huge range of "interactive" uses of the board that are not possible using just a laptop." 

The examples that you cite ("shoot the phoneme" etc) are just the sort of activities that seem to me to be complete time-wasters in the classroom, and - if useful at all - better suited to out of class, solitary activity than what classrooms are best at - i.e. providing collaborative, interactive experiences of real communication. There is so much WRONG with the "shoot the phoneme" activity for starters - its discrete item, decontextualised and non-communicative focus, as well as its native-speaker bias, and its built-in assumption that students will be already familiar with phonemic script - that it's a very poor example of what IWBs can achieve. This, along with the other activities that you mention, seem to suggest that IWBs are best at delivering game-type activities in the classroom, as if these somehow promoted language learning. There is no evidence, that I know of, that games promote language learning. They simply alleviate the symptoms of boredom in the absence of real learning. IWBs seem to be the perfect tool for teachers who have abdicated their responsibility to create learning opportunities, and instead are simply into fatuous entertainment and crowd control. Their interactivity is at the lowest common denominator of choosing between Xand Y and hitting a button, about as creative and intellectually challenging as playing Snap!

As a (very recent) example: on the online MA course that I teach, we are discussing ways of developing learners' senstiivty to features of cohesion in English. One student suggested an activity in which learners collaboratively write a text together all sharing the same blackboard. I tentatively suggested that using a wiki might be an useful way of approaching the same task, although I acknowledged that there was something attractive about all the students working at the board together, as if "painting the backyard fence" . One student responded:  "I think that a collaborative wiki can be useful, but it can't replace live
interaction. I've worked on graphic projects where others have contributed to
the file on their own. We've discussed it and then reworked it separately. I've
had wonderful creative experiences in that way, but it doesn't compare with
rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty together. It's interesting
that on the rare occasion when there is a 'painting the fence' situation at
work, even the most jaded co-worker wants to contribute."

It seems to me that IWBs are a step away from - and not nearer to - the provision of real learning opportunities in the classroom. That is to say, they are not simply useless, they are counterproductive.

A friend I know quite well works for a fairly high-profile software company - so relatively tech-savvy employees, no questions of being tentative with new technology. Gorgeous state-of-the-art offices with hugely impressive facilities and all the gadgets and bolt-ons and "stuff" you care to mention. What is the ONLY thing that remains untouched and unused in their top of the range wired for anything conference rooms? Yeah - the interactive whiteboards. Strange, huh?

Is this the class that scored really well on "shoot the phoneme" game up on my wickedy wicked IWB? or is this the class where Jurg and Sandra had to work really hard to negotiate meaning in a tough negotiation about lay-offs and then share their experience with the rest of the group?

I know the one I want to be involved in.

Candy 

"IWBs seem to be the perfect tool for teachers who have abdicated their responsibility to create learning opportunities"

I can only think the contrary to this statement, where an IWB is the perfect tool to help teachers with their responsibility to create endless learning opportunities.  Isn't an IWB the ideal Dogme tool?  In my classes, I no longer use a course book (unless commercially forced to), happy that I can walk in to my IWB equipped classroom knowing I have an infinite amount of material at my fingertips or more importantly, at my students finger tips.  Lessons are not full of the games I mentioned (I was merely trying to give a couple of examples where students could come up to interact with the board) but more led by the students and their interests, desires and needs.  Lessons are not spent staring at the board and letting it take over, but using the IWB as a tool on the side that can help facilitate discussion and activities - giving the learners and the class the chance to direct the lesson using what they want to talk about, listen to, watch, write about... to create the "collaborative, interactive experiences of real communication" you talk about Scott.

I agree that a laptop and projector could also perform this function, but for the practical reasons I have already mentioned, the IWB is so much simpler, faster, more accessible and plainly put, more likely for teachers to use.

In addition, I feel this is still early days in the development of interactive materials for IWBs.  IWB software in ELT has only just begun to be published but so far I have seen nothing that really makes the most of their potential.  Imagine if you will, a programme that simulates a business context and asks the students to decide the roles they wish to perform in a company, and then gives certain tasks for each student to perform.  The students then move around the room negotiating hard to achieve their task (as you wish Candy!), feed back to the programme on the board (by touching or voting perhaps) which would give an immediate result of the communication they have experienced.  They are then given further tasks depending on the outcome of the decisions that have been made and so on... perhaps a virtual stock market - the students having to buy and sell, with the use of voting devices, whilst interacting with their co-students to get the best price - the board here helps facilitate and guide the situation.  Indeed, the board could act as gateway to make live telephone calls, send emails to businesses in the outside world in order for the students to complete their task.  This would help create a very authentic context evoking emotion in the students that draws out a more natural learning experience, where the teacher's role is to support and feed in language.  I have often found that creating a motivating and realistic context that produces some kind of emotion (and therefore natural communication) from the students is one of the most challenging aspects of teaching.

This kind of software may be a little idealistic and may never happen, but hopefully demonstrates that it is too early to simply say that IWBs are a cop out and cannot perform a useful function in the class, and that they are counterproductive to learning.  I agree, used in the wrong way I'm sure they are, as much as using dictionaries and cuisiniere rods in the wrong way can be counterproductive, but perhaps in this discussion, we could explore ways in which an IWB can support existing trusted pedagogical theories.

Anyone wish to help me defend the poor innocent IWB?? (Help!)

Richard;)

For a balanced appraisal of IWBs in mainstream education see the following:

http://www.futurelab.org.uk/resources/documents/other/whiteboards_report...

Of course, I lit on the following: 

"...other research suggests that the mere introduction of such technologies is insufficient to promote greater interactivity in the classroom, and indeed that use may have had detrimental effects. From this perspective the assertion tends to be that IWBs have been appropriated to reinforce and facilitate more didactic approaches and increase teacher control and 'ownership' of classroom interactions."  (p. 2).

To my mind, activities like "Shoot the phoneme" fall into this camp.

And: "...the introduction of a technology with numerous embedded interactive affordances does not necessarily lead to a more interactive pedagogy" (p.8) - which might well be engraved in stone over the portal of this discussion forum!

On the other hand, supporters of IWBs will find some solace in the report, but since the focus is largely on subject teaching in the primary and secondary sector, and not on language teaching specifically, I still think some scepticism is advised.

(PS I posted this before reading Richard's considered reply to my previous post - so this is not a direct response to his. For the record.)

I find the focus on IWBs as a topic in themselves somewhat bemusing - an IWB is simply a means of controlling a computer. If having a computer in the classroom which is visible to all of your students is a Good Thing (and I can't think why it wouldn't be), then having the means to interact with it easily can't be inherently a Bad Thing. Having said that, an IWB offers, in my view, marginal advantages over using a £30 wireless keyboard to control your computer/projector (as I hope to demonstrate on Wednesday!). Yes, IWBs are getting cheaper, but they're still expensive. The £700 example quoted by Richard is only a 4 foot board, which is rather small for classroom use. Perhaps more interesting are the Mimio and eBeam, which provide a portable means of converting any wall or normal whiteboard into an IWB for around £350 - http://tinyurl.com/2a936x

I find this thread interesting but also slightly strange. I don't believe anything, including the teacher themself, intrinsically makes a positive or negative contribution to learning. Using anything other than to promote learning, i.e. because it is trendy, will probably not be positive. Added to this is the fact that these judgements are intrinsically subjective and should only be considered in the overall context of the teaching.

My actual view of IWBs is that they have the scope to be very positive.

Regards,

Kevin

IWBs: More than "Shoot the phoneme"

I have been using an interactive whiteboard for two and a half years now and things like "Shoot the Phoneme", which I have played -twice- are merely incidental. The benefits of having an IWB in the classroom are far greater than the possibility of playing online games. IWBs really add an element of interactivity in the language classroom. I am not a techno geek; far from that, I love jokes in the classroom, storytelling, group formation, movement or personal stories. My IWB has not removed any of these "humanistic" principles in my classroom. Far from that, it has reinforced them! For instance, I have created reading mazes using Powerpoint as a replacement to cards which I had to photocopy, then make sets, then cut out, then put in envelopes... Now the whole class stands up and the students move to different sides of the classroom, depending on their personal choice in the story. Everyone gets involved, the teacher can play devil's advocate for everyone to hear, the teacher can ask questions concerning the choices the students make. You are getting everyone's attention, you are monitoring everyone, they all get to hear you and your feedback/corrections, etc., everyone is involved. Another practical example. Whenever there is a word the students may not know -let's say a common noun- instead of conveying the meaning to the students by means of a direct translation or a definition or miming or an example, I simply go to Google pictures and show a picture. Then I have the students explain to me! You can do the same thing with videos. On the topic of food, I told my class that I loved sushi. Only one student in a class of 20 was familiar with this food. Instead of explaining what it was I played a two minute video from YouTube (query was "how to make sushi") and as the video played, I was annotating key words on the sides of the screen. Then I made sure the students knew the meaning of those key words and finally the students, in pairs, explained to each other "how to make sushi". And we carried on with the conversation lesson on food. I am sure that language teachers with access to IWBs know better than just play "Shoot the phoneme " online. It's all about integrating what we are already doing well as teachers.

I guess the big question is why your learners were explaining to each other how to make sushi when they had all just watched a video entitled 'how to make sushi'....

I'm holding back on this discussion a little, having written my own 'damn IWB' articles over the past few years, having seen the results of British Council research projects a while back (mostly whiteboard, hardly any interaction). They're tools - like other tools. You can use them well, or badly - can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, but that's no reason to blame the sow.

It's teacher-fronted, it hangs on the wall at the front of the class, it makes you stare at the wall in front of the class... I've seen them used well (primary and secondary in the UK where money was spent on good training) and I've seen them used badly (all around the world, multiple context) but in each case the talent and imagination of the teacher was the key factor - as well as a good working knowledge of the IWB itself.

Trouble is, once you've spent your 2K for a decent setup, you sort of have to use it all the time really, don't you? And perhaps that's more of a problem - this constant staring at the front of the class, at a time when 'eyes front' is considered less than ideal.

Still, at least that's one kind of technology 'non-tech' teachers often seem happy to engage with, and that's a good thing as far as I'm concerned.

"...at least that's one kind of technology 'non-tech' teachers often seem
happy to engage with, and that's a good thing as far as I'm concerned."

Why?? Because it's technology for technology's sake? Because, given a taste of IWBs, the poor unsuspecting teacher will be lured into moodle, twitter and Second Life? Are IWBs the first step on the slippery slope of techno-addiction?

It's been interesting following your discussion about IWBs here and on Twitter.
I think good teachers can make good use of anything and any situation whether it is in a low-tech, low-material (or no-material) class or high-tech class.
Coincidentally, I've just seen the link to this presentation about IWBs posted ---> on Twitter :-)

I agree, Nergiz, but - as I said, I am less concerned about good teachers (who can look after themselves) than, say, my 22 year old nephew who has just taken up a post as a teaching assistant in Japan, and who may be conned into thinking that language teaching is all about "shoot the phoneme".

Nergiz - that's an excellent presentation, thanks for the link (or maybe thanks to the power of twitter!).

So I must rue the day that I mentioned Shoot the Phoneme (I fear this has grown into Frankenstein's monster!), but in summary of the above, can we now agree that IWBs are not useless, but are a potentially very powerful teaching tool that require a greater amount of training than first appears in order to use them in a pedagogically sound manner and to avoid the many counterproductive dangers of misuse?

I look forward to the continuing research into the use of IWBs in an ELT context.

Richard 

Wow - I have just found this discussion after Graham's Tweet! I feel really sad that more people around the world have not managed to find the many really good uses for the IWBs that do exist. We have been using them in the UK, in our county since 2000-1, when we were part of the national trial. Now they are in almost every primary classroom, certainly in our primary schools.

 At the start it was a bit like the start of the internet in school, I remember thinking, in about 1995, when I got one modem linked to one computer - I have it -now how can I make it work for the children and finding solutions! Look where that sort of early work by a huge number of educators has got us! In 2001 when we became part of the IWB trial - again it was a bit of - okay we have them how can we make them work for us - and again we did!

We do do lots of training, and on Wednesday when I train a  group of teachers who are either new to the classroom, or helpers etc., I will show them a simple educational video clip - about 2 minutes long. On that clip will be about 30 important teaching points that may well pass in front of the pupils' eyes as they watch without even realising the significance of what they are seeing. The second time through I will stop the video on two or three of the important teaching points, annotate the screen with their ideas and save those pages and annotations - the teachers will immediately see something new and exciting that they can use the next day in their work, aiding teaching, pupil understanding, assessment of learning - and probably more!

I will show teachers a couple of simple techniques  - magic box and magic paper that can excite and inspire pupils into taking part in their learning in a fresh, motivasting way.

I will give them example resources, encouraging problem solving, discussion in groups or with partners for literacy, maths, science and mfl and show them how these are created giving them opportunities to develop their own resources using the various techniques.

If I have teachers of the very young I will show them kinaesthetic approaches to teaching writing activites to do with their pupils.

None of this is Earth shattering, new or difficult, but it will enable teachers to produce exciting teaching resources that captures the pupils' imagination in new ways.

As I go round schools helping them with assessment they all say that using the IWB has improved the standard of literacy achieved.

I would urge you to have a look at and share http://elearnr.org/2008/08/26/how-to-use-your-interactive-whiteboard-mor... to inspire teacher's work with the IWB.

IWBs are not white elephants - they are an engaging, long lasting resource and do offer value for money. An IWB cannot make a bad lesson or teacher good, but they can make a good lesson or good teacheroutstanding. Please give them chance and persuade teachers to go in earch of training on the internet if not is available in thier situation, there is lots of material available.

Kindest regards

Carol

"An IWB cannot make a bad lesson or teacher good, but they can make a good lesson or good teacher outstanding."

OK, Carol, nicely put. I'm still not convinced that they're worth the price, but I concede that training is key. Otherwise they may actually make a bad teacher worse. My little experience of having IWBs demonstrated to me tends to suggest that they play into the hands of the chalk-and-talk teacher, only instead of chalk it's mouse. Or a sharp tap on the board itself. Tap-and-rap?

How interesting to read these comments!

I just wonder how many of the contributors here have actually been trained properly to use this technology? As an EFL teacher I try to use ANY method of imparting information and knowledge to my students, regardless of whether it is new or old. The important thing is to allow the students to learn, and using an interactive whiteboard (with or without accompanying software) can give language teachers more actual teaching time in the classroom by removing the need for cd players, dvd players or TVs.

I find it incredible that educated people can condemn this technology without weighing up the pros and cons - maybe they did the same thing when computers and the internet entered the classroom?

One problem for all teachers nowadays is motivating the students. Ok, ok, I know that a good teacher will always find ways of motivating students, but they live in a technological society and they are used to having this in their lives. Should we make the classroom a techology-free zone? No matter how good a course book is it will not capture the imagination of students like this techology can, when used properly.

The cost of this technology can be prohibitive, I agree, and teacher training is more important than technology, but how many of you know colleagues who groan when told that they have to attend training sessions? And do they attend and give their full attention to the training itself? Investing in technology can be a safer bet for instituions.

As one older (and wiser?) colleague said to me when I started my first teaching position: 'I won't use computers or CDs in my classes, they're just not relevant to teaching'. Hmm.

Heya, I'm Huda a trainee teacher from Libya. I'd like to say that learners love it, at least my learners! Learners like to use tech while learning, because books can be dull sometimes. Personally I think whatever the tool of teaching maybe, a good teacher will use it professionally!

Hey everybody,

I am Sarah from Libya. I am a trainee teacher. I would like to say that IWBs are very helpful sometimes and they are useless at other times. It depends on who is using them and where they are being used. It is a double-edged sword. In classrooms we should be careful about many things, students' interests and how to make them pay attention, time and a lot more. We should put all these into consideration when we use IWBs.  

Having read this whole thread (!), something keeps making me a little uncomfortable. I know this will not be met with great enthusiasm by many, but it is the underlying suggestion that "communication", "interactivity", "learning opportunities" and all the other buzzwords are the last word in language teaching/learning. I had hoped we had learnt from history, which shows us that every new approach/method is greeted with this same kind of enthusiasm. Anybody out there using grammar translation exclusively?

Don't get me wrong, anybody who has read articles I have written, or had the misfortune :-) to attend one of my presentations, knows that I am a fan of both technology and the general interactive ways of teaching. However, using these kinds of approaches is often actively resisted by students. If I am learning a language, my heart sinks at the words "ok, I want you to form pairs/groups and...". I personally don't like it as a learner. Just give me knowledge and let me deal with it. Whether it is the most effective way for me is of no great interest to me as a student.

How does this relate to this discussion? There has been a very strong argument made that IWBs are evil. This has been based on the assumption that the buzzwords mentioned above are the only thing you should be using. Well, actually, some people like to just sit and look at the board now and again. So, although I disagree with the argument that IWBs are not worth the money, and they clearly can be used for interactive, communicative, student-centred, interesting teaching, using them frontally, and making said frontal teaching more interesting in the process, probably, is a perfectly legitimate use. The ability to save what you have done should not be underestimated. It makes it so much easier to have the file at home so you have the information at hand for preparing follow-up activities etc.

Finally (hoorah!!), the fact that less capable teachers may use a resource badly is a very odd argument, is it not? Guess we should ban the internet for teaching resources as well.

Best regards,

Kevin

I dont want to hijack the conversation, but I have posted a longer response at: http://techteachengage.wordpress.com/2009/03/31/are-iwbs-worth-it/

I love the discussion going on here.  I think the problem is that too many educators have drank the IWB Kool-Aid. I have been trained on a SMART Board, and a Sympodium in my class.  I thinkSMART Boards are in fact relied to heavily upon, and for many become a crutch.  From my experience with literacy, getting students to use blogs, wikis, or discussion boards not only has a greater positive effect - but they are also free.  Teacher's love them because they can engage students, but that is part of our job.

 And I have yet to see strong arguments or evidence of an IWB changing pedagogy in any significant way.  They are nice, and I wouldn't say no to onei f it was offered.  But you can have all the magic pen traiining you want - you are still the sage on the stage.

"Take the IWBs off the teachers and let the students control them" (Marc Prensky in interview with Gavin Dudeney.

I rest my case!

He also said: "Before you can take advantage of the technolgoy you have to change the [chalk-and-talk, sage-on-the-stage, tap-and-rap] pedagogy"

Hopefully I'm not the only one who is confused about what case is being rested where...

Surely the slates and response units are the very things that allow the students (rather than the teacher) to have control over the IWB - or am I missing something? Should we not be arguing that institutions planning to install IWBs do invest in these rather essential "extras", along with lots of training in how to use the IWB in ways that encourages a less teacher-centered and material-centered approach?

Pete

It is a pity that I cannot post attachments - I could show amazing examples of pictures created by Foundation Stage pupils - pre Year 1 so mostly 3 & 4 year olds.

As "painting" on an IWB is a whole hand, arm or body movement and there is no difficult mouse control they are capable of creating amazing pictures!

In fact I have found a small sample - 

http://www.ict.oxon-lea.gov.uk/Postcard08/index.html 

IWBs make learning through games easy, possible, can be groups, whole class, pairs, individula - this is difficult on three or four classroom desktops or worse still laptops

As for extras - all we recommend is a wireless keyboard and mouse  - these can be passed around easily giving control to anyone, anywhere in the class.

Regards

Carol

Sorry - I did not mean that the other things are not useful but that they are not essential to enable IWB use. It was just a response to someone mentioning the need to add extras to make them interactive!

The SMARTBoard - used across our county  - is interactive just by touch, so between touch and a simple wireless keyboard and mouse it is easy to gain full interactivity.

Regards

Carol

I think that dragging and dropping contributions from this thread into the categories of Roger's Adoption Typology for technological innovations (after collaborative discussion) would make for an excellent interactive activity. You could then save it for further future discussion or make the flipchart available on the web for post lesson reflection.

 We took the step of introducing them in all classrooms with a small normal whiteboard as a back up and, as you might iimagine, the howls of anguish at first would have been music to the ears of many on this forum. A couple of years down the line and teachers love them, graduallydeveloping more innovative and interactive uses - and sharing them with each other. In my experience, the most criticism of the IWB comes from those who have little experience of using them. They're not free and an investment in training is definitely necessary, but the return on investment is high and those that have been using them habitually over the last couple of years wouldn't be without them.

I have found this discussion very interesting and useful as I have been researching the use of IWBs in the delivery of  EFL/ESOL. I have learnt much about the pros and cons of using an IWB and just thought I'd make a contribution....  I think there definitely is a temptation to use the IWB as a presentation tool  (I have seen this done) as it seems easier than engaging with the technology but  when I used a computer with a projector and screen - I felt it was inadequate and boring because it was static and I couldn't annotate the screen.  I also agree there is much more that can be done with IWB to make lessons more interactive such as letting the learners take control of the pen.  I also think it could be used in conjunction with a 'blended learning approach' ie. incorporating other EFL type communicative activities into the lesson, role-plays, group and pair-work etc so as not to rely soley on the IWB.  Training is an issue and should be more widely available to make the most of this technology.  Also there are some brilliant demonstrations of lessons on YouTube which give good ideas on how to use it effectively.  I'm looking forward to experimenting with it myself in September when I start my new classes!

That's all!