Sunday, August 30, 2009

NHR on SMARTboards

The NHR has a special piece by Sara Peck. It's about SMARTboards:

Interactive whiteboards, which cost $1,500 to $4,500, have revolutionized classroom instruction and school districts that can afford them are buying them as quickly as they can.

“The more we can put in the hands of our teachers, the better,” said Guilford Superintendent of Schools Thomas Forcella...

According to SMART Technologies, 94 percent of Connecticut school districts have bought the product, with more sales flowing in each day. The company has sold more than 510,000 interactive whiteboards nationwide since 2003, with a 34 percent increase in Connecticut sales from 2008 to 2009. The districts with the greatest number of boards are Bridgeport, Norwich, Greenwich, Cheshire and Hartford.


SMARTboards are included in the capital budget vote set for Tuesday night. Also, I recall being told that the most current version of Cheshire's SMARTboards cost about $7,000 / unit.

Tim White

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Smart boards won't last very long before they need upgrades, repairs and replacements. Who out there is using a desk top or laptop PC which was bought prior to the year 2000 for instance? Where was the actual discussion of the details and expenses to be incurred for keeping this stuff current anyway?

Now, just exactly where will the money for these marvels of modern technology actually be coming from, 2 or 3 year municipal bonds?

None of this stuff should be coming from long term bond money, ever.

Anonymous said...

the boards themselves will not need replacement. They are hardware add ons (like printers, fax, mouse, monitor...) They need a computer to operate but the computer can be swapped leaving the board alone. These devices are pretty impressive. They look and work like a whiteboard and a projector screen combined.

Anonymous said...

They may be impressive as the latest smart phone is. Only problem is these gadgets are built first and foremost with planned obsolescence in mind.

Life cycles seem to be quite short, usually less than 24 months until an upgrade is necessary due either to poor quality or massive global software changes.

Who would knowingly buy a cell phone or a laptop PC with the proceeds from a 30 year mortgage? Answer - - maybe only The Town of Cheshire. After all, we already a heated outdoor swimming pool used year round.

Anonymous said...

Smart boards are a luxury item. One which we cannot afford at this particular time.

Anonymous said...

But "it's for the children," don't ya know. Heaven forbid should they have to use a pen and paper to take notes. They must be entertained to learn.

Anonymous said...

The schools already have a good amount of smartboards. Reducing the funds requested in half is reasonable.

Anonymous said...

Smart boards allow the student the ability to download the teachers notes exactly as they are written. Have you ever been in a sitsuation where you are trying to remember what you saw and got it wrong?

retired teacher said...

RE: "Smart boards allow the student the ability to download the teachers notes exactly as they are written..."

But that's precisely the point. Student's own note-taking is essential for processing and internalizing of learning.

The botton line to effective learning is student study, not smart boards.

The teacher can distribute his/her study notes by
e-mail, website, or paper.

Smart boards are another scam in the spending of billions of taxpayer dollars for dubious "education reforms."

Anonymous said...

I agree, it is just another gadget..in about 2 years they'll be collecting dust...guarantee it wasn't a teacher who wants these things but an administrator type. Money best not spent for these

Anonymous said...

How many of you have used a smartboard let alone seen one? This is progress. As far as the teacher emailing notes, they cannot email what is written on the chalkboard. Alot of times students are looking down at their paper taking notes and before they look up, the info on the board is erased.

Anonymous said...

Alot of times students are looking down at their paper taking notes and before they look up, the info on the board is erased.

September 01, 2009 6:24 PM

Well if there was an attentive teacher in front of the class maybe they'd notice people are still writing and they could keep the info on the board a bit longer. It's not much to ask unless the teacher just doesn't care about the ones taking a little longer to write their notes.

Anonymous said...

"...How many of you have used a smartboard let alone seen one? This is progress..."

Come on, try not to insult our intelligence. I have personally used a great deal of modern technology including smart boards. OBTW, as a college instructor I also routinely used chalk and a chalk board for my lectures. The students even listened and took notes. Some of them graduated and found meaningful professional employment. As for not being able to e-mail what I would put up on a chalk board I would have to disagree. One does not just head to a chalk board and extemporaneously start scribbling. Most class room lectures are first developed on paper or in PowerPoint etc so e-mailing the notes is no big deal.

Smartboards do not belong in a capital budget anymore than the proceeds from a 30 year home mortgage should be used for a vacation.

Anonymous said...

it would be helpful if a teacher whose used them and a student who was in the class could talk about their experience.

Anonymous said...

9:09 If that's what you think would answer the question of whether we should continue to spend tax dollars on smartboards, I'm sure the superindentent could present a teacher & a student who will speak highly of these boards. Do you actually think he'd bring anyone into this that would speak negatively about them?

Tom Ruocco is right - the boe should lump all this spending into one amount and it should go to a referendum.

Anonymous said...

4 years ago people running for the BOE suggested that all smartboards be lumped together as an capital expense and be approved by the voters. The educrats in town did not support that idea because they were afraid the referendum will fail. Without proper, open, honest explanation and discussion it would have, but with an honest explanation of buying them over several years it would have passed/ Orginally the Supt tried to SNEAK the samartboards through as an operational or annual budget item, but several people caught on to that idea and stopped it at the BOE level. The typical behavior continues, if you can't get what you outright, lie, cheat, steal and hide it in a capital budget because we are all on summer vacation and nobody cares to look and participate.