35 replies to this topic

[Dom_Giles]

Hide information behind pictures, or behind white pen marks - when you rub it off it is clearly magic.


More ideas at: Are Interactive Whiteboards (IWBs) a waste of money?

Damn - I thought I'd invented something new but it appears to be a copy of this..

Copy, from google images, a picture which has something to do with your topic. (i.e. a picture of Ann of Cleves if you are studing Tudors with Year 8). On the floating tools bar select the pen and change it so it is white and as large as possible. Then white out the picture so the whole page looks white.

When the class come in all they see is a white, whiteboard. As a starter ask them easy/difficult questions about what you have been doing for the past few weeks. (This can get depressing as you realise they haven't been paying attention!). The student who gets a question right comes up to the board and, with the board rubber, can make ONE CONTINUOUS STRAIGHT swipe across the board. If someone gets the question wrong you hit the back button so the last swipe is lost. Students have to guess what the picture is of before the time is up/ 10 questions have been asked.

Easy to set up, great starter ad a lot of fun.

[Russel Tarr]

I put up on the IWB a picture of a new stone keep castle being attacked and defended.
The class was divided into two groups and using the visual references on the board they had to devise two plans:
1. One for defence
2. One for offence
They then nominated one writer who came up to the board and annotated their plans around the diagram.

Sounds like a good follow-up to this Castles PostIt template which some anonymous user created a couple of weeks ago at ClassTools.net.

With any luck I'll have a IWB in my classroom next September, so I'll be able to try some of these ideas out for myself for the first time!

[Dan Moorhouse]

Sounds like a good follow-up to this Castles PostIt template which some anonymous user created a couple of weeks ago at ClassTools.net.

Anon? Not so, twas I - and your lovely website e-mailed me a copy of it so I could pop it on my site as well.

[Andrew Field]

Come on you two - you're not sticking to the rules. Each post needs an additional idea to keep this thread going.

Here is another one:

Scan in a page from a good piece of work that illustrates good paragraph structuring (i.e. intro, three / four main paragraphs + conclusion). Cut each paragraph out so it is an image. Put the images on the interactive whiteboard and get students to drag them into place, justifying their choices. Once you've prepared the graphics this can be reused to help refresh effective structure in an interactive way.

Sounds like a good follow-up to this Castles PostIt template which some anonymous user created a couple of weeks ago at ClassTools.net.

This is excellent though

[Roy Huggins]

Hi Guys,

Scan several pieces of homework, display them on the IWB and then get the students to annotate and mark it for: Point, Evidence & Explanation or the school grading / literacy codes.

We then discuss what was good / bad about it and how it could be improved. I might then do a follow up modelling exercise using SmartNotes and get teh class to help me write a model answer.

This technique works really well with underperforming lads. I like to give an example of an outstanding, middle of the road and needs to try a lot harder piece of work.

You'd be amazed at how the under performing lads suddenly up their game when they realise that there is a chance I'm going to scan and display there work .....

Of course I make sure that no one knows to whom the work belongs ....

Kind Regards

Roy

[Dan Moorhouse]

Come on you two - you're not sticking to the rules. Each post needs an additional idea to keep this thread going.

Oops, naughty me.

Heres two to make up:

Split videos up into clips. Grab stills form significant turning points in film and use them as stopping points - what happens next? Simple but effective predicition task - also works the other way around, grab a 'fade to black' and do a review in white on the screen. Either way, it can be recorded and used for revision purposes.

Use the timer. Very simple method but most IWB's have a timer with 'alarm / sound' function built in. You want them to do it in 10 minutes? Time 'em and have a noise to let them know when the times up. Also works with starters / bell tasks, switch to count down mode and hit start as the first kid turns up. That works brilliantly alongside a post it task from classtools.net, great bell tasks!

[Tim Laver]

I'll have to admit also, to being inspired by some of these ideas and shoe horn them into the session I'm doing for Scottish History Teachers at the end of this month.



What I often do is use the IWB as a board game board. I've set up interactive versions with a multi media authoring tool called OPUS ( I'll upload one to share when I can ).



But it's quite easy to set one up in the likes of Activ Studio or easy each. Basically a trail of squares like snakes and ladders around the board. Activ Studio also has a handy dice roll tool inbuilt.



I then divide the class up into 5 groups. 4 sets of players and one set of Game Controllers. The class then have 20mins to either revise a brand new topic or set as many questions as they can on the topic. Pupils are told that they can answer as a group and have their jotters open, but not the text book.



After this time we play the game, with various variations. Eg in the interactive ones a square can either give a nothing, question or event card. Some allow just two counters on the square some one. The best reaction is the Nato board I set up that only allows one player per square or you get sent back to the start. The rule being its forward one if right, back one if wrong. The genius moment comes when a group land in between two others and realise they are in a lose lose situation. The classes love it and are totally focused for the preparation time taking as many notes as they can.

[Lesley Miller]

Here 2 ideas for IWB

1. Catchphrase 'Say what you see'. Can be used in smartfile or a powerpoint which is not as a show (i.e. when you are editing it and can move things around and insert text)

-Insert a picture of something either topic related or ridiculous.
-Cover the screen with different textboxes. These could be questions to answer or words to explain or translate.
-Divide the class into teams. Wave the mouse over the screen and stop suddenly over a textbox. If a team can answer the question etc correctly then delete that square.
-Continue in same way till a team can correctly identify the picture beneath.

2. Family Fortunes
-Write up a question e.g. Our survey asked what were the causes of W.W.II
- Below use bullet points to write down your main reasons.
-At this stage print off the page for your use during the class.
- In Smartfile use white highlighter to cover the answers or in powerpoint use a rectangle shape.
-Play according to rules of family fortunes.
-If a answer is correctly identified then reveal it on the board ( this is why you need your own copy with the answers visible)
-Once the board has been completely revealed you can then discuss the placings of the reasons. E.g. did one deserve to be lower down or further up? You can move them around and then use it for essay or exam practise.

[Tim Laver]

Lesley for your #1 suggestion, you could in power point either set up the boxes as trigger objects ( thus making them disappear in show mode) or find the drag n'drop macro for power point and create boxes that could you could lift off. This would make it all look a bit more pro ;-)

[A Finemess]

This is more of a lesson than a tip but it worked fine per 6 today with a restless S1 class.

TASK

Demonstrate and practice revision techniques
Prepare revision mind map of first S1 History topic.

Started with a short intro about what revision means. Lots of (S1 remember) the kids had only a vague idea. Some said they had never done any revision.

A pupil was asked to leave the class and stand outside. (I always teach with an open door!) I called out a simple question e.g. "What colours are the walls painted?" Answer = One right but one wrong! I tried another couple of students with simple questions. Got 50% correct!

This made the point that learning / memory has to be active not passive. I then repeated the exercise after giving the class two minutes to look around and try to remember classroom features. Result? A much higher success rate.

Next to the smartboard where I had pre-prepared the core of a mind map on the topic we need to revise. Pupils copied this into their jotters. Obviously a hand out could be used to save time.

On to the next note book page. Same mind map core - central part contained the topic title; four outer bubbles contained sub sections from the topic : Stone Age, Early Civilisations, Classical Age, Middle Ages. Around the mindmap randomly placed were the key developments / inventions related to the topic.

Next a quiz - two teams take it in turns to place the inventions in the correct part of the mind map by moving them around the mind map. I joined the text to the core mind map using two different coloured pens.

OK, I'm a traditionalist - the boys won on this occasion!

Next the class had two minutes to study the mind map carefully. Then I used the "blind" feature to cover it. They had to place as many as they could remember. Then I allowed them to compare notes with a partner to "top up" their mind map. Finally I pulled the blind up to let them see if they had missed any.

OK I could simply have put up the mind map correctly done and got them to copy it. Would that have been as much fun? Would it have made the point about learning? Would it have involved the class in the interactive facility of the board?

Well, all I know is that for a last period lesson with a class which had just come from PE, it worked a treat!

Edited by A Finemess, 09 November 2006 - 09:12 PM.

[donald cumming]

I should probably add the google maps/any image new tool maplib to this - its pretty cool.

I've also attached a very simple activity I made using the drag&drop macro for powerpoint mentioned above. If you follow Tim's link, right click and save the powerpoint its magic! My tips for using it are:

1) You will probably be asked to enable Macros then change your Macro security settings to medium
2) Press F5 to see how it works (click once, move click to drop), and the next slide has further instructions.
3) You have to use ‘Save as..’ when you’ve created your own slides (so you can keep the original file).
4) If you try a brand new presentation the drag&drop functionality won’t go with it and you’ll just get an ordinary slideshow. So you have to open the original, change the slide and use ‘save as..’
5) Oh, and kept the little arrow buttons – that’s the way to move about when you’re using drag&drop
6) Lastly you can’t do any animation on a slide that has drag&drop on it. I think you can on the other slides still.

I hope this all makes sense – I think its pretty cool to be honest (but then I am a bit of a geek!)

Attached Files

•  german_leaders.ppt   120K   66 downloads

[Chris Higgins]

A good revision tool using the IWB is to play the Richard and Judy game, 'You say. we pay'. A volunteer sits with his back to the board whilst behind him/her images of key figures from a unit of study are revealed (you can do this by creating ppt. with time settings to change slides after 30 seconds). The class must describe the significance of the figure on the IWB so that the student can guess who is being described. Run the game with three different students (who have to satnd outside the class until it is their turn) to add a competitive element. The template for this and other IWB games can be found here:www.igshistoryonline

[Andrew Field]

A good revision tool using the IWB is to play the Richard and Judy game, 'You say. we pay'. A volunteer sits with his back to the board whilst behind him/her images of key figures from a unit of study are revealed (you can do this by creating ppt. with time settings to change slides after 30 seconds). The class must describe the significance of the figure on the IWB so that the student can guess who is being described. Run the game with three different students (who have to satnd outside the class until it is their turn) to add a competitive element. The template for this and other IWB games can be found here:www.igshistoryonline

This is indeed an excellent activity - although this isn't for Interactive Whiteboards - this can work just as well with just a projector. If there was some additional interactivity I suppose it could be adapted for IWBs.

This does help with the argument though that for most learning activities a digital projector is the key aspect, rather than the interactive whiteboard.

Here is another idea for an IWB. Have a whiteboard page up with all the words relevant to a topic jumbled up in the middle. Create a section on the screen that says 'Don't know' and one that says 'Know'. Divide the class into teams. You then play a game of bluff. Each time a member of a team comes up and drags the word into 'know' or 'don't know'. If they claim they know the word (and nobody challenges them) that team gets a point. If they claim they don't know the word they can challenge someone else to try and define in. The twist comes when they claim they know and are challenged by someone else.

I can explain more, but I'm sure you get the general gist.

[Lou Phillips]

I've recently been to an "e-fair" for A-level practioners so can I add podcasts and vodcasts to the list? Lots of free ones can be downloaded from iTunes and elsewhere and shown using the board. Simple but effective.

[donald cumming]

Really I'm just sitting on Andrew's coat tails here but why not go to the website below, get the fridge magnets and have keyword spelling contests on the IWB.

Fridge Magnets

The website has other very useful trickery too - a countdown timer which has different songs to time activities; a wheel of fortune; a bingo generator; etc. Essentially lots of ways to get the kids up, out of their seats and at the IWB with you.