SMART Board Center Stage on Back-to-School Night

Since my first Back-to-School Night nine years ago at my kids' elementary school, the routine has been pretty much the same. The principal stands up before an auditorium full of parents and speaks. In the classroom, the teacher stands at the front of the class and talks about what the kids will be working on throughout the year.

This year was different. This year, it was all about the technology. The principal, reading from prepared remarks in her office conference room, was beamed into classrooms onto the school's 28 SMART Boards to tell us about all of the new SMART Boards in the K-5 school. The PTO co-presidents made their pitch for supporting the PTO the same way.

Afterward, my daughter's 5^th grade teacher talked about the school-year goals with the help of a PowerPoint presentation that she tapped along with her knuckle on the large-screen electronic white board. Then she went online on the SMART Board to show us Moodle, the online site where kids can do assignments, write on blogs, and talk to each other about school work. She spent most of the night tapping around the screen to show us what the kids have been doing on the site—writing their reflections on math, writing, reading, and about books they have been reading and want to read.

The interactive white board mirrors what's on a computer in the classroom. The board is touch-sensitive and a digital projector displays what's on the computer screen on the board. You can control the computer applications by touching the board, add things using digital ink markers, then save the work done on the board for future work or for students who aren't in school that day.  

We spent the entire session in half darkness staring in awe at the SMART Board. Next year, it will no longer be a novelty, I'm sure, just another fixture in the classroom. I've seen technology take on a bigger and bigger role in my children's school day in the past decade, and now it is front and center. And the kids, who spend their time moving between all kinds of screens, love it. For now, they are paying attention.

"Let me tell you, your children are really comfortable with technology," the fifth grade teacher told us. "I've learned a lot."

By the way, she also mentioned by fifth grade, kids should have their multiplication facts down cold, and lots of the kids do not. We'll be using some low-tech index cards to practice some old-fashioned multiplication between keyboarding sessions at home this fall.

Related: Moodle Extends the Classroom Online