This is the first of our posts to feedback and communicate what’s happening and what we will have learnt from the 2008 Interactive Whiteboard Conference at Firbank Grammar School in Brighton, Melbourne.

After Anne, Bec S and I landed in Melbourne this morning, we proceeded to Firbank to the afternoon’s proceedings, which included classroom tours and a walk around the exhibition hall.

Firbank has both Junior (Primary) and Senior (Secondary) schools, and we had the opportunity to tour the small all-girls primary campus.  Each room has had an Activboard for some time, and several teachers we met agree that they now could not live without one in their room.  They are using a variety of personally-produced and commercial resources to support the learning in their classrooms.

One of the great things to see was that the school has fostered a culture of encouraging students to grow as learners - they encourage students to be creative, critical, and to take risks; risk taking is something which is applauded in the school.

We also saw in the software exhibition this afternoon some resources that piqued our interest, including new Maths resources from Origo, Literacy resources from Pearson Education, the comprehensive Swark resource, and 2Simple Software.

The conference keynote and workshops kick off tomorrow morning, so perhaps we can feed back some more after then.

Robert

In recent staff discussions regarding 2008, I’ve had many people ask me directly, or tell me they’ve asked others (such as John) for an interactive whiteboard in their classroom next year.   The interest has certainly been encouraging.

I hope you can understand that the question of who gets an IWB can’t be answered yet because we haven’t even asked it.  The key question before this can be considered is that of how much money can be directed towards this resourcing next year.

So, to help us in eventually answering the question of who/what grades should have IWBs installed next year, I have one simple question…

Why do you want an interactive whiteboard in your classroom next year?

Reason: just curious.
I look forward to your answers.

Today Sandra, Kathryn, Rebecca, Judy and I visited St. Bernadette’s at Castle Hill to see Interactive Whiteboards in action.

While each member of this team has an interactive whiteboard in their room, we really haven’t had much opportunity (if at all) to see others use them in the classroom.

The team at St. Bernadette’s were very welcoming and happy to share their experiences with us.  The principal, Ted Langford, was my teacher when I was in Year 3 (almost twenty years ago now - sorry, Ted), and from his initiatives to introduce computers to my primary school back in the 80’s through to today, he’s very much committed to providing the best contemporary tools to support quality teaching and learning.

Our team has learnt a lot of great ideas.  They’ve also had a great opportunity to see how another school approaches education, and how technology is used in a tool in the teaching-learning cycle.

As I blog, our Year 1 team are just coming to the end of their Interactive Whiteboard training session with Leah Rix from Commander.  It has been a fantastic session in beginning to understand the workings of the Activboard and the potential of the Activstudio software.  Our colleagues are really finding it to be worthwhile experience. 

As we come to a close, Year 1 are starting to explore some possibilities for using flipcharts and Activstudio in their Science and Technology unit for this term.

Our Year 4 also will begin their exploration this afternoon.  Interest in IWBs is spreading as well, and we welcome as well colleagues from St. John Vianney, Doonside, to see a little of our demonstration and training.  The great aspect of this whole acquisition process has been the ability to share wisdom with other schools in the Diocese that have walked the same journey.  Hopefully we can continue to share with others who want to engage in this exciting opportunity

It’s been one of the most awaited events in the St. Michael’s calendar for 2007.  If this blog is to believed, it’s even been the talk between the world’s most powerful men!  Finally, our interactive whiteboards are now mounted on the wall.  6 down, 2 more to go (hopefully tomorrow we’ll have a date for next week when 1H and 1B will be finished), but the whole process has been quite exciting, and perhaps a little stressful and tiring (from some peoples’ perspectives, at least).

Thanks to Mark and his team at Coastelec for your great work on the installations.  The rooms look fantastic and the result is very professional.

Now, all the lucky teachers are asking is “when can we start playing?”  Well, USB cables, extra sound connectors and powerboards should be in tomorrow, so the question really is “when do you want to start?”  We will be scheduling some initial training, and perhaps even some visits to see the boards in action in other IWB-established schools.

June 12/13 have been set as the dates for installation of our new interactive whiteboards in Year 4, Year 1 and 4/5K.

There will be some inconvenience as classes are shuffled to different rooms during installation, but it will be worth it.

A timetable will be drawn up this week, but it will be Year 4 (and hopefully 4/5K) on Tuesday, and Year 1 on Wednesday so as to best fit the PE/Music timetable (making some rooms conveniently vacant).

Our Year 4, Year 1 and 4/5K teachers are counting down the days!

Going… going…

As a grade partner of mine left their room on Friday afternoon, they said goodbye to me (as we friendly people in Year 4 do), but then also to her chalkboard.

It was a realisation that when we walked back into our rooms on Monday morning, the first and very obvious step towards a very different classroom would have already been taken.  The chalkboard … gone.

Yes, we’ll retain the smaller (and formerly sliding) whiteboard, but the interactive whiteboard (due for installation very soon) will provide a never-before-seen opportunity at St. Michael’s to really change the way we teach and learn through the new tools available at our fingertips.

The shock of a missing chalkboard was a little more brutal in our Year 1 rooms almost a week ago.  As one teacher put it, “… there were 5 minutes there when I was in stand-still shock, but then it was okay…”  The missing chalkboards revealed an unpainted wall - yes, their boards were built in to the classroom when it was built in the 1970’s!  Come this Monday, the should have a pleasant surprise - new feature walls painted this weekend before the new IWBs get installed.

My colleague and I reflected on all the things we were led to believe would happen in the year 2000 when we were kids.  The 21st Century was going to be a world where your house was up in the air, you drove hover cars that would fold up into a briefcase, and we’d all have a robot at home to do the housekeeping!  Yes, the makers of The Jetsons have a lot to answer for today.  But, with 21st Century technology in our classrooms, perhaps we’ll be able to inspire and challenge the learner that will one day build that fold-up hover car…

This weekend will see the beginning of the end for “old technology” in several of our classrooms.

Daryl will begin the task of removing the chalkboards from our classrooms that are soon to receive interactive whiteboards.  Year 1 will be where work begins, so teachers will need to have the chalkboard and the attached pinboard clear.

Daryl also hopes to retain the existing sliding whiteboard and fix it to the wall in part of the newly cleared space that won’t be needed by the the IWB.

Thanks in advance both to Daryl and to Norm from Nagle for their work and their willingness to do it on the weekends for the sake of everyone’s safety and sanity

Hi everyone.  I hope everyone is having a good Easter holiday.

I know it is holidays, but I’m just writing a quick post as I didn’t get time to update people before the term ended on our progress with our IWB setup.

Finally, we have a projector.  Nathan and I reviewed all the paperwork that was piled up on my desk to decide on the BenQ MP721c data projector.  Looking at the criteria from our last projector post, here are the features that got it across the line.

• Lumens: 2200 of them.  That should make for some bright images in our classrooms
• Resolution: XGA.  If we wanted to save more money, SVGA could have sufficed, but it would have been almost impossible to discern detailed images from the back of the room
• Noise: only 28 dB (24 in eco mode).  Most products in this price range are over 30 dB
• Lamp Price: mid-range.  Fairly standard for projector lamps, and often vary from supplier to supplier.  Given this projector was ahead in all other categories, this was not going to rule it out
• Projector Price: the standard price was highly competitive against other brands
• Overall, we had been happy with the BenQ we bought in 2004, so we had our own brand recommendation.

Finally, after making the decision, we had to get a good price from one of the many suppliers out there.  If you’re from another school and ever need to do this, I can’t over-emphasise the need to shop around!  We made enquiries with 5 suppliers, got back quotes from 3, pushed another 2 and searched the net for suppliers to make sure we were getting a good deal.  Even dangling the carrot of wanting 9 projectors wasn’t enough to push some “business and education” suppliers below some Internet prices for 1.  Fortunately, Nathan again got on the phone and got a really great deal from Queensland-based Direct National, who we bought our last BenQ from.  My best advice is to search the net for prices to learn what you should be expecting to pay.

So now, with the first term ended, we have:

• Ordered our 8 new ActivBoards (our Year 1 classes are also getting the new ActivWand to help with reaching the top of the board)
• Ordered our 8 projectors
• Arranged for an installer to visit our classrooms during the holidays to prepare a formal quote
• Requested quotes for sound equipment to support the full multimedia capabilities of the technology

So we’re well on track.  We should have things up and running in Term 2.  Once we know for certain all our expenses in setting up these rooms, then we can look at buying our extra computers!

As we announced this week to staff, our grant funding has been approved, and thus our plan to install 8 Interactive Whiteboards (IWBs) into classrooms can go ahead. This is just the beginning of our plan to introduce IWBs into classrooms across the school.

So now my classroom desk is littered with papers as I sort through all the purchasing that’s required. We know we want Activboards, and we know who can install them for us. So at present, our focus is on the most “unknown” element at present - the projector that will shine on the actual IWB.

Sounds easy, right? Find a good projector at a good price? Perhaps, but it gets more challenging the more you think about it. The projector is a crucial piece in the puzzle. Get it wrong, and it can impact on the whole setup, which at several thousand dollars a room, is something we want to avoid. So what are we looking for when choosing a data projector to work with our IWBs?

Lumens. It’s got to be bright, hasn’t it? We’re looking to find a projector with a standard minimum of about 2000 ANSI lumens.

Resolution. Higher resolution means sharper images that can be seen more easily from the back of a classroom. Considering what you can get for your money nowadays, XGA resolution has to be on the list.

Noise. Thanks to Daryl (our maintenance man) for this advice. No teacher wants to have to yell over the top of the equipment. We’re checking the specifications of each projector for their fan noise output in decibels. Only a couple in our price range so far have fallen under 30dB.

Replacement Lamp Price. This is an essential criteria. Lamp prices vary greatly from brand to brand and from supplier to supplier. What’s more, at several hundred dollars each, they’re an expensive ongoing cost. Some reasonably priced brands have very expensive lamps.

Projector Price. Of course, the projector finally has to be good value for money. There are lots of suppliers out there, and the Internet gives a guide to what prices should be like. However, when ordering 9 projectors at once like we are, there’s a little more room to negotiate and score ourselves a cheaper price. Let’s just hope all the suppliers I’ve emailed in the last couple of days come to the party.

Anyway, that’s where we’re up to at present with our IWB rollout - negotiating a projector deal. We’ll keep blogging to keep you informed with our progress.

By the way, our picture for this article was sourced from morguefile.com, a free image archive. It could be useful in teaching and learning, especially as we want to encourage children to respect an author’s copyright and discourage plagiarism.