Social Benefits

Social Benefits

Effective teachers engage students in ways that they too become a part of the lesson. Students must be integrated in a meaningful way that still helps them concentrate on learning the material (Lemov, 2010). This interaction can manifest itself through different forms such as small groups, experiential projects, and the use of current events. The IWB supports such interactive pedagogy. IWBs allow for more socializing within the classroom and help create class unity. The actual physical structure of the IWB allows for a more conversational set up (Murcia & Sheffield, 2010). Here technology helps teacher to student face-to-face interaction by eliminating the barrier of a laptop or desktop computer in front of either party. Instead IWBs engage students around a large surface that help captivate the educational material.

Another social benefit that IWBs have within a classroom is connecting one classroom to another. “…IWB may serve as a type of alternative to the teacher as the center of attention and may enhance cooperative learning in the class, contributing to the development of autonomous learning and higher order thinking skills (Manny-Ikan & Dagan, 2011, p. 252).” The students gain more freedom in their learning and are dependent on the information not the instructor. IWB can be used to connect one classroom to another in a digital way. Thus IWBs expand students’ learning further than the four walls that confines them in a single classroom. Teachers using IWB in this manner often motivated students to use the IWB to write notes that can be shared among the class electronically (Mitchell, Hunter & Mockler, 2010).

Examples of student engagement can be found in a music classroom when a teacher displays the sheet music of two pieces and ask students to highlight the similarities between each piece. In a science classroom, an Internet simulation is displayed so that the entire class can be included and participate in the lab. Furthermore IWBs can be used in a math classroom to display diagrams and functions that can later be saved and distributed to students after class (Dash, 2004).