We're Being Noticed

From a UK educator's blog, The Server Room, comes this recognition post.

On a related note, there’s a new Australian Blog about the use of IWB’s in education: ActivBoarding. They’re using six (I think?) Promethean ActivBoards with ActivStudio. It looks like a good place to watch for a fresh perspective (most of the stuff I’ve seen is very UK-oriented) and interesting resources. It’s a shame there’s not an open/common format between the whiteboard programs (particularly between Smart, ActivStudio1 and Activstudio2) as being able to share flipcharts etc seems to be one of the key benefits of the IWB experience. We’re firmly in the Promethean camp at school, so I’ll be passing these links on to those that can’t when I return to work on Monday.

See, blogs are great for tapping into other people's networks and being part of the conversation. Next week - Introduction To Blogging - Computing Room - be there if this captures your interest.

More ActivBoarders On Their Way

Thanks to all attendees at this afternoon's Professional Development session on ActivBoards 2006. I counted 18 educators in the room at one stage in between losing our original brainstorm list somewhere between my original presentation flipchart and showing people how to insert images! As I pointed out, the seven of us who started with boards in August have barely had them for a term and we have only scratched the surface of the potential. So, I was really heartened by the keenness of our new potential ActivBoarders. The questions were great - I hope I got to the core of what you wanted to know. When the feedback comes back in, I will share it here so that you can see what fantastic plans people have for this teaching and learning tool. I forgot to share the final cartoon I had lined up that was a good way to finish. Check it here.
Thanks to Rachel at BardWired for that link.

Laptop Trouble

ActivBoarders, if your laptop is giving you grief, then there are other uses for it. It can be used to assist the preparation of the evening meal. If you want to consider other uses other than crunching data or preparing flipcharts, more can be see at Wacky laptop tricks. My class loved the photo of the laptop as a replacment frisbee.

Relevant Posts From My Blog

I have a number of posts on my personal blog, Teaching Generation Z, that are on the topic of ActivBoards or IWB's in general that may be of interest to readers of this blog who don't read my blog (or are unaware of it!) So for IWB users and potential users here are links to a few relevant recent entries that relay experiences or thoughts on this topic: Disagreeing With A Legend, Why An Interactive Whiteboard?, Gathering Evidence, ActivBoard Lesson Screen Dump and The Missing Ingredient - Ownership. Love some feedback on some or all of them.

TechLearning Feeds Me Great IWB sites

I have a feed in Bloglines from TechLearning that throws some interesting sites my way that would be great on the IWB's. This is great for Science (hint, hint, Meredith) or looking at ecosystems, evolution etc. It's called Build-a-Fish and it is a lot of fun to play around with - I can just see a group of kids in Learning Area 9, discussing the required features of a fish etc. Check it out....