I teach second grade with a Smartboard. Examples of how I use it:
-Every day, students enter their lunch choices on an Excel spreadsheet. The spreadsheet creates one of a variety of graphs (bar graphs, pie charts in different formats), and we discuss the results. Through this, students learn basic computer uses, as well as learning to read graphs.
-When I do read-alouds of picture books, I generally place the book under the document camera (sort of like a fancy overhead projector that doesn’t need transparencies). Students may thereby read along with me, and they can see the pictures in the book very easily. Without the document camera/smart board, I could either prevent students from reading the text, or limit myself to a very small selection of “big books” that can be read from a distance.
-When something cool scientifically comes up (a crop of mushrooms outside, an interesting spider, colorchanging leaves in fall, etc.), we can look at it magnified magnificently under the document camera and discuss our observations. This is mostly just fun, but it’s also good for building scientific observation skills. (We do this once every week or so–it’s just a perk)
-When teaching about Venn Diagrams (for example), I can build one on the smart board, and we can drag concepts around in it. We read two similar books (Oliver Button is a Sissy, and Amazing Grace), discussed traits of each, and then built a Venn diagram with similarities and differences. Doing this on a white board would have been much more difficult.
-When we’re brainstorming ideas as a class (e.g., on the benefits of a private ballot), I can sit in the back of the room and lead the discussion by typing the ideas on the board, using my remote keyboard. I can also walk around the room with the keyboard, using proximity to quell off-task behavior, without stopping the lesson. With a whiteboard, I’d have to keep my back turned to the class whenever writing ideas. Also, I type neatly at about 80 wpm; I write at about a quarter this speed, if that, and pretty messily.
-It’s great for teaching math concepts: for example, I created a screen full of different shapes and had student drag congruent shapes over one another. When teaching about multiplication as repeated addition, it’s easy to copy a set multiple times.
-If something comes up (“What’s a gnu?” was a recent question), I can turn the smartboard off, Google a picture on the connected computer that faces away from the class (smartboard off so that I can prevent students from seeing the picture of the topless woman riding a gnu that somehow made it past the filter), and turn the board back on. Picture, often with some text from National Geographic or something. Without the Internet connection or large display, I could still do this with a set of encyclopedias, but displaying the information would be much more difficult.
-When we’re revising student writing, I can plop a sample under the document camera, and everyone can see the concepts we’re working on, and we can do it together. Without the document camera, I could do this with a chart, but it wouldn’t be authentic student work, and it’d take me a helluva long time to set up.
-When we’re working on phonics, I generally create my lesson ahead of time (for example, a chart with various consonant blends), enabling me at lesson time to pull it up quickly instead of having to create it on the spot on the board.
I use it in almost all whole-class lessons. It has many advantages over the old technologies. Yes, it’s just a tool, like a hammer–but if you think carefully about how to use it, it offers tremendous advantages over the old tools.
Daniel