Individual Whiteboards, a CFU-lovers dream
Earlier this week, I noticed a bit of a trend when stopping in some classrooms — quite a few teachers were using individual whiteboards with their students. If you haven’t seen them before, the name pretty much says it all. Just imagine taking the big whiteboard off the wall (just imagine, please don’t actually do it), chopping it up into about 18×18 inch pieces, and giving one to each student along with a marker and eraser.
I’ve seen them popping up all over the place — in Kindergarten classrooms at Rose Linda and a 7th grade classroom at Pastor, just to name a couple. I definitely fought back some tears of nostalgia as I thought back to my days using them regularly when I taught 7th and 8th grade math — they were one of my favorite strategies.
However, as you might have experienced if you tried them, just picking yourself up a set of whiteboards doesn’t magically equal student achievement. Like anything with teaching, there’s no silver bullet — it’s how well you plan and execute that will determine their effectiveness.
So, in that spirit, the Department of Data is pleased to present the highly official DOD Guide to Individual Whiteboards, in our probably-overused FAQ format…
I get the basic idea, but what do I actually do, and when do I do it?
It’s easy: give each student an individual whiteboard, a marker, and an eraser, and you’re off and running. They make great “we do” material during guided practice — when it seems like most students are finished with an answer, have them all hold up their boards so you can scan the room to see how everyone is doing all at once. Boards down, erase the boards, on to the next question. They definitely work well for math, although I’ve seen them used in other subjects as well, such as for handwriting practice. They’re also a great strategy during a review session, say after school or the day before a big test. Looking to step up the student engagement a notch? Have students pair off and compete against each other to see who can get the most correct answers (hint: this also prevents those wandering eyes, as students will hide their answers).
Other ideas? Use them with groups of students during centers/stations. Try a game of jeopardy. Have students trade boards and correct each others’ answers. The possibilities are endless, so be sure to mix it up from time to time. You can get some more ideas from this Education World article.
Why are individual whiteboards effective? And why is the Department of Data writing about them, anyway?
Besides a variety of other benefits (such as the fact that students are somehow magically more engaged, if implemented correctly), my favorite reason for using them was because they make a spectacular Check For Understanding strategy. Have your students hold up the boards, and you can quickly scan the room and see where your class is at. Leave yourself some flexibility in your lesson so you can speed up or slow down on different types of questions depending on what you’re seeing. Sometimes, I would use whiteboards as almost a discovery-learning-style strategy. Say I was teaching adding fractions. I might throw up a problem first, let students try it on their own, then do a little direct instruction on how to do it correctly, then give them another problem (or several) to try. The direct instruction would be extremely targeted since I would already have a good feel in the moment for how many students could already do it correctly, but more importantly, I’d have a good gauge of what the common mistakes were. Rinse and repeat until mastery.
So what does this have to do with data, you ask?
My response: Are you crazy? What part of this doesn’t just scream “wow, that’s is an incredibly effective way to obtain quick in-the-moment data about student mastery”? Sure, it’s not the in-a-fancy-spreadsheet-with-special-colors data that we know and love. In some ways, it’s better. It’s real-time. It’s immediately actionable. It’s not just 0s and 100s. What more could you want in life?
Ok, if I’ve sufficiently strong-armed you into thinking this is a good idea, let’s talk logistics. Where does one get some whiteboards without breaking the bank?
This is my favorite question to answer, as it’s much easier than you’d think.
Boards: First off, do not go down to your local teacher supply store to pick these up, unless you’ve got loads of extra cash lying around burning a hole in your professionally dressed pockets. Instead, head to the local home improvement store (Home Depot definitely works, Lowe’s probably does too). They might look at you a little funny if you ask for a “set of individual student whiteboards that I can use during my GP as a CFU”, so instead ask for shower board, which comes in large sheets that they’ll be happy to cut for you (tell them your a teacher and they might not charge you for the cuts). I’d go for somewhere in the 12 to 18 inch square range. You might aim for the large end if you’re teaching long division, or perhaps a more rectangular shape if you’re using them often for handwriting. All in, you’re talking $10-20 for an entire classroom set of the boards, which is about a cheap as great classroom supplies come. Feel free to donate any leftover cash to the Department of Data Chipotle Fund.
Markers: That’s where things can get a bit more expensive. See if you can get them through your school. Otherwise, wholesale places like Costco or Sam’s Club can be a good bet. Most importantly, setting up those classroom expectations for being careful with the markers, not pressing too hard, putting the caps on, etc. will go a long way. I typically had to buy a new set about 2-3 times a year, but that was with 180 seventh and eighth graders going through my doors each day.
Erasers: I usually found a great deal on these — I could get a box of about 200 of what I like to call “magical flexible erasers” for only $1.49. Some others might call it a box of Kleenex.
How about some power tips?
Sure, here’s a few:
- play music while students are working on a question. Train students to know that when the music goes off (make sure you have a remote control), they should hold up their boards.
- at the end of the class/lesson, as a reward for good whiteboard behavior, give students 60 seconds to draw whatever they want on their boards (or prompt them with something fun). Just be sure to hammer home some sort of “keep it appropriate” message.
- revisit classroom expectations each time you use the boards. Check out the PowerPoint listed in the next bullet point for a list of the ones I used in my classroom.
- try using a PowerPoint to display the question, then when students are finished, click to show the answer. Combine with a music for a powerhouse review session. Check out the opening to this PowerPoint from my TeacherTechToolkit workshop for an example that you are more than welcome to steal.
Well, those are a few ideas that are hopefully helpful, but we’d love to hear your ideas and questions? Have you tried using whiteboards? How’d it go? What are you wondering? Let us know by leaving a comment in this post or send us an email at ddmphx at teachforamerica dot org. Happy whiteboarding!
