Interactive Whiteboards and the Journey to ‘e-teaching’ Peter Kent Deputy Principal Richardson Primary School Canberra, Australia.
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Published in SNAPSHOTS – Specialist Schools Trust Journal of Innovation in Education, Volume 1 Issue 2, July 2004.
Introduction Over the past two years Richardson Primary School has transformed its entire educational program based around the widespread introduction of interactive whiteboards into the school. A recent review of this initiative states “ Richardson is the first school in the ACT, and probably Australia, where the total school community, the students, staff and parents, has embraced a new approach to the use of ICT, which enhances the holistic education of the students…… The Richardson effort represents a near revolution in the use of ICT in schools.” This paper will describe the new style of pedagogy that has been developed to take advantage of this technology as well as the key supports structures within the school that has made this innovation successful. The Richardson Primary School Context Richardson Primary School is a government primary school located on the southern fringe of Canberra within the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). It has around 220 students, with eleven classes – two are learning support classes - and a teaching staff of 14.6 (Full Time Equivalent). Richardson Primary is one of the few schools in the ACT to receive special school funding to redress disadvantage. It has an active Parents and Citizens Association but does not have access to the kind of fund raising potential of most other Canberra communities. Traditionally Richardson is not viewed as one of the sought after teaching appointments, and has a history of significant annual turnover of staff. Innovation and Revolution In a staged process over the past two years Richardson Primary School has fully equipped its classrooms, library and computer lab with a technology generically known as interactive whiteboards. Within the Richardson context they are know buy their brand name “SMART Boards”. An interactive whiteboard set up involves the image generated by a computer being projected onto a touch sensitive screen the size of a conventional whiteboard, where a touch is the equivalent to a mouse click. It is simply a touch screen computer with a very large screen, however “the interactive whiteboard is more than a computer, a projector or a screen – its sum is greater than its parts” (Glover 2001). Lee and Boyle (2003) state, “after noting how the technology is now being employed at Richardson, the generic term ‘interactive whiteboard’ fails to communicate the immense education capacity of the tool. In reality Richardson is using the technology as a large-scale, digital convergence tool.”
The interactive whiteboards have allowed teachers to take advantage of power of ICT within the ‘teaching’ component of the teaching and learning process in ways that that are just not possible with the traditional personal computing approach to ICT in schools. Teachers at Richardson Primary School have coined the term ‘e-teaching’ to describe the new pedagogy that is evolving promoted by the use of the interactive whiteboards. Succinctly, ‘e-teaching’ involves the use of ICTs to enhance the art of teaching. Harnessing the potential of digital technology in presenting a concept, exploring implications, placing the concept in various contexts, creating links with existing knowledge, and leading discussions that probe student understanding and allow students to take their learning in personally relevant directions. E-Teaching is essentially a group activity and so sits comfortable within a classroom. The group can range up to the size of a normal class group. In this way e-teaching differs from conventional approach of incorporating ICTs into teaching programs, where normally the activities are aimed at the individual or small group. e-Teaching is a move along the spectrum away from a didactical pedagogy to a more interactive one. Students can not only interact with SMART Boards in ways that are simply not possible with a standard whiteboard, they can also interact with the content and context of the lessons by digitally capturing and manipulating their work and local environment, incorporating it within the lesson and sharing it with the group. e-Teaching in the Richardson context involves teachers managing this convergence of digital information from a wide range of sources and devices when presenting, discussing and reflecting upon a concept with a class group. In an ‘e-teaching’ context, a multi-literacy teaching and learning environment is standard. The students’ experience with their computer games and TV enables them to easily relate with the multi-media, multi-sensory, multi-faceted style of lessons e-teaching promotes. So why is the term ‘e-learning’ common, and ‘e-teaching’ sound strange? Probably because teaching with a computer is an extraordinarily difficult task for a variety of reasons. Trying to teach a class a new concept using computers where there are only a small number within the classroom is practically impossible. For starters you cannot present a concept where all the class cannot see the computer screen. Computer Labs are the other main way schools set up ICT resources, yet those teachers with experience teaching in a computer lab will know just how difficult it is to ‘teach’ in these settings. Gaining and maintaining student attention is a tricky task when students are sitting in front of a computer. The scope of a teacher or student to take an investigation into a particular concept in an unexpected direction is limited by the flexibility of the particular software being used. If it is possible to adapt the software, or perhaps open another program, the process of gaining the class’ attention, directing the class in a particular direction, seeking their opinions on the implications of this direction and making this new piece of information fit in with their existing knowledge is again practically impossible. This is why terms like ‘self directing’ and ‘self administering’ are often associated with good educational software. The point of this article is not to diminish the value of computer labs and computers in the classroom, rather to point out that these resources are aimed at facilitating ‘e-learning’. Using technology to amplify our professional classroom skills, using ICTs to enhance the teaching process is still for the majority of us a dream. Up until now ‘e-teaching’ has been the elusive promise that technology has had for education since the introduction of computers into school.
The Richardson Strategy You often hear “it is not just the technology it is how it is used”, while this is true attention must also be given to the strategy put in place to support the use of the technology. Lee and Boyle describe the ‘Richardson Strategy’ the end result of which is success generated through ‘e-teaching’. The Richardson Strategy was based on educational leadership, rather than technical leadership, combined with ongoing structured professional reflection, discussion and support. The aim of these two thrusts was to produce high quality innovative teaching that would take advantages of the possibilities interactive whiteboards provide. The SMART Board technology has proven to be incredibly robust and the operating software has a Microsoft look and feel to it. This enabled teachers to start using the basic features of the technology after only a brief introduction. The school’s leadership team was able to provide leadership on issues such as “why are we using SMART Boards in our teaching?”, rather than deferring the leadership to relatively inexperienced teachers with good technical skills who would be obliged to lead on basic technical issues such as “how does the technology work?”. Due to the novel nature of interactive whiteboards within Australian education, Richardson Primary found itself reliant on its own resources when developing teaching methods to use in conjunction the technology. In response to this situation the school leadership team halved the number of administrative meetings within the school, replacing them instead with structured professional support sessions where the focus was on professional reflection and discussion about teaching practices that incorporated SMART Boards. Teachers were motivated to base their thinking in the existing context of their professional skills as teachers and encouraged to discover ways that the technology could enhance these professional skills. Through group sharing, discussion and celebration of their experiences a rich set of teaching strategies was developed that took advantage of the interactivity and digital convergence that interactive whiteboards can provide. Teachers were allowed to follow directions that were personally relevant to themselves and their teaching context. This provided a great diversity of skills that could be shared across the teaching staff, ensuring that all were leaders and learners during the professional support sessions. As the pedagogy at Richardson evolved it became distinctly different from the ‘traditional’ approach to incorporating ICT in schools. This different approach began to be called ‘eteaching’ and now provides the framework for the ongoing development of teaching strategies that are still evolving with the integration of interactive whiteboards.
The Results. The results of the interactive whiteboard initiative, the Richardson Strategy and ‘eteaching’ have exceeded all expectations that we had at the beginning of the process. A comprehensive review of the program by Lee and Boyle can be found at www.richardsonps.act.edu.au . Briefly however, the move to an e-teaching approach at Richardson Primary has resulted in a number of positive effects. “Richardson Primary has succeeded in getting its total community, its children, parents and staff, to embrace the use of ICT in education in a manner never done by any school in the ACT”. “Richardson is the first school in the ACT, and probably Australia, where the total school community, the students, staff and parents, has embraced a new approach to the use of ICT, which
enhances the holistic education of the students.”… “There has been a significant down turn in photocopying, a trend predicted in the mid eighties for schools that is not known to have been reproduced elsewhere” (Lee & Boyle 2003). The level of student engagement in the education program at Richardson Primary has been enhanced by the use of interactive whiteboards. Lee & Boyle found that “In Richardson the student reactions to the new way of teaching and learning were dotted by terms like: ‘it’s cool’; ‘it’s engaging’; ‘it’s fab’; ‘it’s fun’; ‘SMART work is easier’; ‘we can go back and look at earlier work’; ‘it’s like having an up to date library in your room’”. The parent community have embraced with the enthusiasm ‘e-teaching’ with interactive whiteboards, based on the positive effects they have observed in their student’s learning. Lee & Boyle describe comments from parents including: ‘kinders are learning at a phenomenal rate’; ‘kids help each other’; ‘kids are able to see their peers in action’; ‘importance of having the visual stimulus’; ‘the bright kids are being pushed’”. Standardised testing results (ACT PIPS 2003) indicate that the rate of student learning in the area of literacy has been accelerated within Richardson Primary School’s kindergarten cohort, when compared to Australian Capital Territory means. Amongst the staff Lee & Boyle found that “There is a universal pride among the staff regarding what they have achieved, both collectively and personally.” They found that in the past two years the group of teachers have markedly enhanced their ICT skills now wants to acquire the higher order skills to progress the program even further. “While some still express reservations about their ICT capability, the reality is that collectively the Richardson staff has developed an expertise in the educational use of the interactive whiteboard technology that is probably unparalleled in Australia” (Lee & Boyle 2003). The Future Within both Richardson Primary School and the wider education community, interactive whiteboards and the pedagogies described through an ‘e-teaching’ framework are here to stay. The ‘e-teaching’ framework will grow and evolve over time, as both teachers become more experienced in the use of the technology and as the digital environment within which the world operates evolves. Where the future leads ‘e-teaching’ and its impact on education is unknown. As long as teachers take pride in their professional skills, and use these skills as the basis for the development of teaching methods to be used in conjunction with interactive whiteboard, I have every confidence that the schools and students will benefit greatly from this technology.
References Glover, D. & Miller, D. (2002) The Introduction of Interactive Whiteboards into Schools in the United Kingdom: Leaders, Led, and the Management of Pedagogic and Technological Change, International Electronic Journal For Leadership in Learning, 6 (24). Lee, M. & Boyle, M. (2003). The Educational Effects and Implications of the Interactive Whiteboard Strategy of Richardson Primary School – A Brief Review, http://www.richardsonps.act.edu.au (Accessed 1 November 2003).
