A thoughtful writer comes up with explanations for Interactive WhiteBoards' tepid success in helping students, and great success in selling product to administrators. Lesson: now sell your stock in Promethean. Check out this article on Edsurge , by J.Orbaugh. As much as I have loved using Interactive WhiteBoards in the classroom, their cost seems quite disproportionate to the benefit in most classrooms. In most cases, a simpler technology that allows the computer to track gross pointer movement onscreen would be sufficient. The extra software control requires so much investment in training -- and adjusting lesson plans -- that few teachers use it, and few administrators allocate the training time and administrative attention to get it used. Again we return to my basic assumption: administrator attention is where things happen.
Thoughts on education, technology, and culture, during an international career.