Interactive Whiteboards in Education – Why?
Capacity
The capacity of an interactive whiteboard (IWB) to incorporate a wide range of media and produce student-centered
activities is a driving force behind their increased use in education.
ALL digital resources: Devices (microscopes, GIS devices, scientific sensors, etc.) and resources (Maps, video,
audio, simulations, websites and all other types of files) can be used in conjunction with the board as well as be
embedded into the files created with the whiteboard software. Because of the large display surface, the board
makes viewing, listening and interacting to various forms of media feasible for a whole class, providing a variety of
modalities to support learning.
This capability also allows teachers to conduct real-time or recorded demonstrations where space and easy-viewing might
have been problematic without the board.
Lastly, the ability to use an instrument to interact with the virtual manipulatives displayed on the screen adds a tactile
component to the virtual experience.
Research
Educators look at technology tools as just that – tools – that have the capacity to facilitate the teacher’s utilization of
specific, research-driven instructional strategies. The interactive whiteboard by itself does nothing; the interactive
whiteboard in the hands of a competent teacher allows that teacher to implement a number of instructional design
strategies that would be difficult without the board.

Research Point 1 – Multimedia Design – Visual and Verbal Learning
The working memory is dual coded with a buffer for storage of verbal/text elements, and a second buffer for
visual/spatial elements. These two channels work together without interference, to augment understanding.1 The
board allows teachers to bring visual elements into the instruction. (Not bringing those into instruction limits the
brain capacity for learning – only one channel of working memory is utilized.) Significant increases in learning
can be accomplished through the informed use of visual and verbal multimodal learning.2

Research Point 2 – Interactivity
In a recent metastudy conducted by TheMetiri Group, when the average student is engaged in higher-order
thinking using multimedia in interactive situations, on average, their percentage ranking on higher-order or
transfer skills increases by 32 percentile points over what that student would have accomplished with traditional
learning. The interactive components of the whiteboard, when used appropriately by teachers, help facilitate this
interactivity in ways that cannot be accomplished without the board.
First Step to Ubiquitous Computing
The continued purchase and use of paper textbooks is rapidly becoming a learning resource of the 20th century – designed
for a historical economic and social environment now gone by.
As textbook companies and others rush to provide all-digital resources and curriculum (decidedly advantageous when one
considers the static, often outdated, and controversial curriculum of the textbook – think Texas), school systems know that
the road of the future will be supplying each student with an electronic device that 1) connects to those multimedia
curriculum/resources and 2) provides access to cloud space for students to collaborate with many other learners and
publish portfolios of their work.
The interactive whiteboard is a step in preparing teachers and students for that 21st century learning environment and will
be a key tool when that day arrives.
1
2
Baddeley, A. D. (1997). Human Memory: Theory and Practice: Psychology Press.
Mayer, R. (2001). Multi-Media Learning. Cambridge University Press.
Loudoun County Public Schools, 06/10
Two Channels in Working Memory: Visual and Text/Sounds
Loudoun County Public Schools, 06/10