Interactive whiteboards: boon or bandwagon? A critical review of the literature

Abstract

This article reviews the literature concerning the introduction of interactive whiteboards (IWBs) in educational settings. It identifies common themes to emerge from a burgeoning and diverse literature, which includes reports and summaries available on the Internet. Although the literature reviewed is overwhelmingly positive about the impact and the potential of IWBs, it is primarily based on the views of teachers and pupils. There is insufficient evidence to identify the actual impact of such technologies upon learning either in terms of classroom interaction or upon attainment and achievement. This article examines this issue in light of varying conceptions of interactivity and research into the effects of learning with verbal and visual information.

Teaching Turkish as a Foreign Language with Interactive Whiteboards: A Case Study of Multilingual Learners

“…Then, students, in groups, wrote appropriate comments about the pictures on the board and discussed their points with other groups. In all of these activities, the intention was to increase active involvement of the students in the learning process by facilitating interaction between students and the instructional content on the IWB as well as interaction among students as suggested by researchers (i.e., Beauchamp and Parkinson 2005;Moore 1989;Smith et al 2005;Türel 2010) in order to achieve an effective IWB use.…”

“…I will certainly use an IWB in my classes. Smith et al (2005) suggest that IWB can be used for any type of courses and subjects to the extent of the teachers' knowledge and skills regarding the design of an effective instruction with an appropriate IWB use. Taking into account the various benefits of IWBs, we can conclude that IWBs can be used for the improvement of diverse language skills (i.e., reading, writing, speaking) as Březinova (2009) suggested.…”

“…IWBs enable instructors and students to use and manipulate digital content during instruction. Many studies address the contributions of IWBs to instruction as well as students' learning and motivation in school settings (Bell 2002;Levy 2002;BECTA 2003;Brown 2003;Beauchamp and Parkinson 2005;Cutrim-Schmid 2006MathewsAydinli and Elaziz 2010;Smith et al 2005;Türel 2010Türel , 2011aTürel and Demirli 2010;Xu and Moloney 2011a;Ç elik 2014).…”

“…Today, researchers from various disciplines are seeking alternative ways and solutions of using information and communication technology (ICT) to achieve more effective, interactive, and enjoyable instruction in schools (Hall and Higgins 2005;Smith et al 2005;Türel 2010). Interactive whiteboard (IWB), as an ICT, has been a growing trend to design more interactive learning environments in many disciplines including language learning (Tozcu 2008).…”

The Use of Interactive Whiteboards to Support the Creation, Capture and Sharing of Knowledge in South African Schools

“…There is ongoing debate as to the reason behind the popularity of multimedia content on IWBs [12]. From a purely technical viewpoint, some refer to the IWBs ability to present information in vibrant colours, and the ability to move, manipulate, and zoom in on information as enhancing the learning process [13,14].…”