SMART Boards have been around since 2009, when the first five were bought and installed in classrooms at LHS. Proving effectual, the school bought 16 more in 2010 and another 16 in 2011, which makes 38 total. Five more are being requested for next year, and if that gets approved, there will be 43 SMART Boards throughout the building.
Clearly, SMART Boards have been pretty popular if so many are being bought. But, how much of an improvement are they, really?
SMART Boards definitely have their advantages. I mean, who doesn’t want to write on a SMART Board? They just look more fun than the regular boards and are easier to pay attention to because you’re half focusing on how cool the highlighting feature is. However, they’re more than just an attention-grabbing decoration: they’re also practical. For example, they’re time savers. They don’t require cleaning and make transferring notes from the board to students a lot easier. This is especially nice for absent students who can just ask the teacher to print off their saved Word documents with all of the improv drawings and charts. A few DOI staff members really appreciate the boards and think they are useful and efficient.
They are also a fantastic addition to classrooms where the teacher has knowledge about the technology beyond how to turn it on and off. Some teachers use the device to make the class more interactive. For example, trigonometry teacher Joe Roth has a game on his SMART Board where the students get devices that allow them to communicate to the SMART Board and type in their answers. This makes the entire learning experience more interesting, which is not an easy feat.
“The SMART Board has really helped me improve my instruction over the past two years. One of the biggest improvements to instruction is that it has allowed me to essentially eliminate transition time,” Roth said. “Instead of walking over to the computer when I need to use certain programs or different applications that require the computer, I can now just do all of that from the SMART Board. It may not seem like a big deal but it allows me to stay engaged with my students at all times during a lesson.”
However, while some staff members find the SMART Boards useful now, the majority feels they only have the potential to be great in the future. Currently, without teachers having knowledge of how to use them, they’re pointless and irritating. It’s not uncommon for the SMART Board to freak out and the teacher spending more time fixing it than teaching. Yes, like all great technology, the SMART Boards have kinks and malfunction once in a while but if the teacher can fix them in less than ten minutes, it’s not a big problem.
The SMART Boards themselves are the future and they won’t be going anywhere soon. We propose that instead of keeping them around for future classes and experiencing the same kinks and lack of knowledge about how to deal with them, the teachers should figure out how to work them. Teaching the teachers how to use the new tool should be more of a priority because they really do have great features that, when used properly, enhance the learning experience. They could be a great improvement, but what’s the point of having them if no one knows how to use them?
Photo by I. Alesna