Learning and Leading - February 2010

Science on the Big Screen

an inquiry-based approach to science teaching is effective in helping students, including those with special needs, learn at a deep level. Interactive whiteboards make it easier to incorporate inquiry-based teaching into the science classroom because they provide an environment in which the open-ended questions so characteristic of inquiry-based teaching and learning can be explored through a variety of media.

The interactive whiteboard is a powerful tool because it allows teachers to illustrate abstract concepts in a variety of ways. For example, special-needs students often struggle with the ideas that matter is made of particles too small to be seen without magnification, and that the behavior of those particles depends on the temperature of the matter.

Collaborative Lessons

Using the interactive whiteboard, teachers can easily and clearly show the behavior of particles in solids, liquids, and gases and how particles behave as matter moves between the phases in multiple ways.

University of Colorado has a free physics education technology interactive simulations collection at http://

Mette Schwartz and Joan Thormann

phet.colorado.edu/simulations/sims. php?sim=States_of_Matter. The site allows users to vary the temperature using a drag-and-hold button and watch the response on the motion of the particles. The simulation also allows students to choose different substances to observe the effect of heat on particle motion.

This simulation allows teachers and students to ask probing and challenging questions. The teacher and students can record, explore, and summarize these questions using the writing tools. The interactive whiteboard can then capture the entire lesson digitally as it is constructed by the class collaboratively.

The whiteboard allows the interac-
tion to take place on the big screen
in front of the whole class, allowing
all students to participate. Students
can annotate the images and capture
specific comments and questions. The
teacher can save screen shots digitally
and print, e-mail, or post them on
a class website so that students can
review lessons at home or with an aca-
demic support teacher. The students
who constructed this lesson also have
a take-away (either digitally or on pa-
per) to use as a study guide. In addi-
tion, special-education teachers, who
may or may not have participated in
the lesson, have a record of what hap-
pened in class. Moreover, middle or
high school teachers, who may teach
five sections of the same subject, have
a running history of where each class
is in their understanding. Similarly,
elementary teachers, whose opportu-
nities to teach science may be limited,
can use the interactive whiteboard
files to pick up where they left off.

Reviews and Formative Assessments The ability to easily keep a digital running record of each class’ learning allows the teacher to activate prior knowledge effectively and efficiently. The record serves to remind teachers and students of how far the class, as a whole, has come. Also, the use of interactive whiteboard files as a review can serve as an ongoing formative assessment by allowing the teacher to elicit whole-class responses. For example, the teacher can use interactive whiteboard records to remind students of earlier learning, pose a whole-class question, and elicit responses to guide both review and further instruction.