Interactive whiteboards have been rapidly introduced into all primary schools under UK Government initiatives. These large, touch-sensitive screens, which control a computer connected to a digital projector, seem to be the first type of educational technology particularly suited for whole-class interaction. Strong claims are made for their value by manufacturers and policy makers, but there has been little research on how, if at all, they influence established pedagogic practices, communicative processes and educational goals. This study has been designed to examine this issue, using observations in primary (elementary) school classrooms, and builds on the authors' previous research on ICT in educational dialogues and collaborative activities. Keywords: Interactive whiteboards; pedagogy, primary education, multimodality, learning technology BackgroundAs part of the UK government's plans to embed Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in schools, substantial investment has brought Interactive Whiteboards (IWBs) into the everyday life of the primary (elementary) school classroom (as described by Higgins, Beauchamp and Miller in this issue). The introduction of IWBs is expressly related by policy makers to the goal of raising attainment through improving pedagogic practice; strong claims that the use of IWBs can 'transform' teachers' practice are made by both policy makers and manufacturers. The underlying assumption is that IWBs will have blanket benefits for learning, as former UK Secretary of State for Education Charles Clarke (as quoted by Arnott, 2004) asserted: 'Every school of the future will have an interactive whiteboard in every classroom, technology has already revolutionised learning'.However, as has been the case with earlier ICT initiatives, there is a danger that the introduction of this expensive, potentially valuable piece of equipment is 'technologyled' (i.e. it is introduced because it is available) rather than 'education-led' (i.e. it is introduced because it is known to meet the professional needs of teachers and the educational needs of children better than existing educational tools). There is no doubt that IWBs have some interesting affordances that could be of value for classroom teaching (for a full discussion see Higgins, Beauchamp and Miller, this issue). Our research, which draws on work on teacher-pupil communication and on the introduction and use of ICT in educational settings, stems from the conviction that there is a need for a more detached consideration and evaluation of the IWB as a pedagogic tool. By conceptualising the IWB from a socio-cultural perspective as a tool or 'mediating artefact' (Wertsch et al., 1993) in primary school classroom practices, we aim to take into account the relationship between the affordances of IWBs, the pedagogical practices of teachers and the communicative repertoires of teachers and pupils.In a recent study of whole class teaching in primary education, Burns and Myhill (2004) examined the nature of teacher-pupil interaction. In accord wit...

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This paper explores how wikis may be used to support primary education students' collaborative interaction and how this such an interaction process can be characterised. The overall aim of this study was is to analyse the collaborative processes of students working together in a wiki environment, to be able to unfoldin order to see how primary students can actively create a shared context for learning in the wiki. Educational literature has already reported that wikis may support collaborative knowledge-construction processes, but in our study, we claim that a dialogic perspective is also needed to accomplish this. Students are requiredmust to develop an intersubjective orientation towards each other participants' perspectives, to be able to co-construct knowledge about a topic. For this purpose, the our project utilised a '"Thinking Together'"-type approach to help students to develop an intersubjective orientation towards one another and to support the creation of a 'dialogic space' to co-construct new understanding in a wiki science project. The students' asynchronous interaction process in a primary classroom ,-which led to the creation of a science text in the wiki-, was analysed and characterised, using a dialogic approach to the study of Computer-Supported Collaborative LearningCSCL practices. Our results illustrate how the 'Thinking Together' approach became embedded within the wiki environment and in the students' collaborative processes. We would argue that a dialogic approach for examining interaction can be used to help to design more effective pedagogic approaches related to the use of wikis in education and to equip learners with the competences they need to participate in the global knowledge-construction era.

Three studies of student regulation of learning were undertaken. In the first study, the temporal organization of the self-regulation process was examined within an individual learning context. Multilevel analysis showed linear and quadratic relations between self-regulation process and the phase of learning. An unexpected negative direct relation between self-regulation and test performance was only found for the process of ''directing''. In the two other studies, collaborative computer learning within a 3D environment, on the one hand, and within the context of literacy practices, on the other hand, was examined. Self-regulative processes as ''monitoring,'' ''directing,'' and ''testing'' occurred less frequently than ''grounding'' and ''common agreement'' activities. In all three studies, the students rarely ''orient'' themselves towards the learning task. It is concluded that the adequacy of regulation and not the frequency is important for student learning.

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Interactive whiteboards (IWBs) have been widely introduced to English primary schools (5-11 years) in the last decade and this has generated much research interest. In the past, research has focused on IWB-use in teacher-led sessions, attending particularly to the nature of teacher-pupil interaction at the IWB and the apparent motivational advantages for children. In contrast, this study focuses on children's communication and thinking during their semi-autonomous use of the IWB during collaborative groupwork in primary school science lessons, aiming in part to see if the IWB is suited to this type of use. Over the course of one school year, twelve primary teachers of Years 4 and 5 (8-10 years) took part in a professional development and research programme which involved them in devising a sequence of three science lessons incorporating small-group activity at the IWB. The functionality of the IWB is analysed here as means for supporting the children's joint communication and thinking, using embedded cues and the availability of certain features in the IWB technology. Our observational analysis of two examples of children's collaborative activity in different classrooms, together with subsequent group interviews, suggests that the IWB can make some identifiable contributions to children's productive communication and thinking. However the IWB is not seen to be an entirely distinctive or pedagogically transformative learning resource in the primary classroom. In our developing conceptual framework, the children's knowledge building is closely related to their active engagement in using IWB affordances and their productive dialogue, essentially supported by the teacher's scaffolding strategies, the establishment and use of "talk rules" in conversation, and the opportunities and constraints applying in classroom participation structures. These conditions help the children to deal with interconnected social, cognitive, and technical problems arising over time. Certain aspects of this form of computersupported collaborative learning (CSCL) are discussed. These relate to the integration of the

All communication is inherently multimodal, and understandings of science need to be multidimensional. The interactive whiteboard offers a range of potential benefits to the primary science classroom in terms of relative ease of integration of a number of presentational and ICT functions, which, taken together, offers new opportunities for fostering multifaceted pedagogic strategies. In this case study, we examine in detail how a teacher pursues two themes across four science lessons. We examine how the teacher creates continuity in her students' learning experiences through taking up some of the affordances of the IWB in order to represent scientific phenomena and engage children in activities to consolidate their understandings. Support is offered for the notion that while pedagogic goals and strategies must determine the selection of tools, rather than the 'tail wagging the dog' as in technology-focussed hyperbole, planned use of the interactive whiteboard, conceptualized as a 'heterogeneous mediational tool kit' (Wertsch 1991), can be effectively integrated into teaching practice.