Smartboards Affects Core Content Understanding

One textbook cannot meet the needs of students in my fifth grade class, who read at a wide range of levels. My goal is to reach all students and enable them to engage meaningfully with the content. The textbook alone is inadequate as a tool with which to do this. My plan is to use interactive whiteboard technology (a “Smart Board”) to enhance the understanding of the 5th grade material. My hypothesis states that there is a positive relationship between Smart Board use and greater engagement and understanding of core content material. Students who actively participate in lessons with which Smart Board technology is used will demonstrate greater knowledge of core content and achieve higher test scores on end-of-chapter tests compared to students in other fifth grade classes at my school who do not participate in Smart Board-driven lessons. The research question is this: How will the use of Smart Board technology affect fifth grade students’ understanding of core social studies content, as measured by end-of-chapter exams?

Assessing Student Engagement and Performance

Chapman (2003) discussed various ways in which teachers can assess student engagement rates and performance. According to Mathewson (1994) because of the big emphasis placed on levels of academic achievement in schools there have been several studies done highlighting student engagement; these studies focus on what factors will keep the students involved in the learning process.

Chapman (2003) talked about methods by which student engagement could be measured, including teacher observation and self-reporting by students. The author also reported “some educators have used work samples to assess levels of learning task engagement, focusing again on students’ use of higher cognitive or metacognitive strategies in confronting learning task.” The end-of-chapter tests will serve as the work samples by which the performance of fifth grade social studies students will be measured. Correct answers to objective questions will be easy to calculate. Subjective questions (e.g., short answers, essays) will perhaps demonstrate the level of student understanding to a greater extent, since there is no chance of the “lucky guess” that can skew the results of a true-false or multiple choice test. In discussing open-ended responses, Chapman warned “the efficacy of these methods hinges on the use of suitably structured tasks and scoring rubrics.” It will be important to standardize grading in the classroom when making the case for using Smart Board technology to engage students and increase achievement.

Technology in Today’s World

There is no question that technology in today’s world has made an enormous impact on children, both in and out of school. Olson (2010) cites Pew Research findings about technology and its use by school-age children. He states that in 2008, seventy-four percent of students between 12 and 17 owned or had access to technology. The numbers are astonishing, 77% owned a game system like Xbox, and over 60% have computers. Olson (2010) concluded that “today’s children are not just interested in using technology – they expect to use it” (p. 35). Methods of teaching must respond to these expectations. Some educators decry the use of technology. Tally (2007) cited criticism of educational technology by educator, author and cultural critic Neil Postman, who called classroom use “a distraction and an irrelevance.”

While there may still be teachers who believe that traditional teaching methods are most effective, Taylor and Duran (2006) cited a study that directly contradicts this notion, particularly with respect to social studies content. Having taught 5th grade social studies I concur with the survey findings of over 1,400 American adults who described history class as boring and strived to make history more hands on. “The respondents recalled instructional practices which were overly focused on the reading of textbooks and the memorization of facts”(p.11)

Smart Board technology is relatively new and not enough time has passed to examine the results of any longitudinal studies (if any are being conducted) regarding its effectiveness in the relationship between its use and improved achievement by elementary and middle school social studies students. However, in my findings, some success has already been reported anecdotally.

Byrd (2005) stated "this new wave of teaching is so much more hands-on, integrated and thematic instead of worksheet and drill-oriented.” (p. 12) In teaching social studies content at Byrd’s school, Liberty Drive Elementary in Thomasville, North Carolina, teachers retrieve maps and images from a database; teachers and students alike can use Smart Board highlighters to note geographic features.

Similarly, in a study sponsored by the University of Michigan-Dearborn, social studies teachers reported that students were more engaged in lessons delivered with the use of technology and the level of student achievement increased. Taylor and Duran (2006) were not surprised by this finding and noted “the positive effects which the use of computers has on student achievement in history have been documented by the United States Department of Education.” (p. 10)

The use of technology in the social studies classroom is not a brand-new phenomenon. Even ten years ago, White (2000) concluded that

Social Studies has experienced a tremendous transformation regarding the integration of technology. Despite remaining a discipline whose status in schools and society is much less than adequate, professional social studies educators are engaging in dynamic technology oriented projects. These projects not only have a very positive influence on the discipline of social studies itself, but we are also witnessing a greater impact on our students. (p.1)

Ten years hence, technology has evolved in ways that White, indeed any of us, could scarcely imagine. While there is no data that tells us exactly how many classrooms nationwide are equipped with Smart Boards (and how many of those are being used on a regular basis), there is evidence that there are a good number of teachers of social studies who are using Smart Boards. The Smart Exchange, a free website sponsored by Smart Technologies, invites teachers within all disciplines to post lessons they have created. Anyone can download lessons to use “as is” or to adapt to their own classrooms. As of the writing of this paper, there were nearly eight hundred social studies lessons posted. A simple Google search, using the terms “smart board” and “social studies” revealed that a number of school and district websites are repositories for lessons created by teachers and made available for use by others.

Conclusion

In conclusion research indicates that today’s students are technologically savvy and expect technology to be used in the classroom. Research also indicates that students are more engaged in lessons where they can actively participate, using technology as a learning tool. It seems reasonable to expect that Smart Board technology will be effective for teaching social studies to a group of fifth graders with diverse learning styles and abilities. It also seems reasonable to expect that greater engagement will facilitate understanding of the content, as reflected in scores on end-of-chapter tests, a measure used by all the fifth grade classrooms school-wide.



References
Byrd, D. (January-February, 2005). Sixteen whiteboards capture students’ attention. Media & Methods,41(4), 11-12.

Chapman, E. (2003). Practical assessment, research and evaluation. Retrieved December 3, 2010 from http://pareonline.net/getvn.asp?v=8&n=13

Olson, C.A. (February, 2010). Making the tech connection. Teaching Music. 17(5), 30-35.

Smart Exchange. Retrieved from http://exchange.smarttech.com/search.html
?q=social%20studies

Tally, B. (2007, Spring). Digital technology and the end of social studies education. Theory and Research in Social Education, 35(2) 305-321.

Taylor, J.A., & Duran, M. (2006, November). Teaching social studies with technology: New research on collaborative approaches. History Teacher, 40(1) 9-25.

White, C. ed.. (2000). Society for information technology and teacher education international conference: Proceedings of SITE 2000 (11th, San Diego, California, February 8-12, 2000). Retrieved December 3, 2010 from http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED444562.pdf