Part 1: Discussion on IWB Assignment

29th August 2007 – On this bright, sunny day, a number of mini conferences was held at MK2. ….CONFERENCE?…… Actually, today we had discussion on our major assignment related to SMARTBOARD in our respective groups. We are required to design a lesson to be incorporated with the use of smart board tools and Interactive White Board (IWB). We have to integrate the use of smart board tools for English, Mathematics or Science topics. Each group member is to produce a lesson. My leader has already divided the work to us on a democracy basis last week. Tussna, Nanthini and Loura will be working toward producing an English lesson each while Lali, Maisarah and I will be working on a Mathematics topic each.

Introducing the members of TECHNO_THINKERS present at the Conference. Doesn’t it sound professional? (sigh). Unfortunately, none of the delegates present are techno-savvy. We are all novice to this ICT. However, we will not give up to produce a good lesson each despite of all the obstacles namely lack of ICT skills.

My group discussion was led by Ms. Maisarah, our leader. Maisarah gets the ball rolling with some housekeeping matters namely on the topic chosen and on our progress. Each of us explained our ideas briefly to the group members to let them know the reason why we chose a particular topic and a rough idea of the lesson. The rest gave feedback to each other to further improve on our lesson ideas. It is indeed crucial to have a valid reason for choosing a particular topic to be integrated with the use of IWB. This is because, not all topics are suitable for use with IWB. This has been mentioned by Prof Raja and also has been clearly highlighted in the Assignment 2 outline posted in the Moodle. Thus, it is crucial to discuss why one chose a particular topic so that we can correct each other if we are not in the right track.

Since, I have been assigned to do a Mathematic lesson, I chose to do the topic of TIME.

Why I chose the topic of Time for my IWB lesson?

The very reason why I chose this particular topic is because time has often been traditionally conducted by using clock face and so on. Often pupils are asked to read and write time by looking at the hands of the clock either on real clock or on diagrams of clocks. But are the children really involved in the lesson? It is something questionable. Young learners might be just reading the time by pouring back what they have memorized. Perhaps they have memorized the hands on the clock from 1pm to 2pm (1.05 pm, 1.10pm, 1.15pm etc). Thus, they will be able to read time within this range. However, they may face difficulty, when they are required to read time beyond this range. For that reason, children should be exposed to the real concept of time in order to enable them to read and write time successfully. Learning how to tell time is a skill that will last a lifetime. Learning how to tell time has never been so easy. Based on the Constructivism Theory, one learns better by constructing their own knowledge. Therefore, it is crucial, to engage children in the lesson so that they can construct the concept of time on their own.

Hence, by incorporating the lesson with the use of smart board tools and IWB, teachers can actually evaluate pupil’s understanding. Teacher will be able to detect if pupils have not acquired the time concept. This is because; IWB lessons are aimed for hands on activity to engage the pupils. In that case, pupils can manipulate the smart board tool to show their understanding.

Back to the discussion (conference):
I am still working on my lesson. I really need to look into many other aspects like pupils’ level, learning outcome and practicality in order to produce a quality product. As usual I was playing the role of assistant leader to remind the rest of the important criteria to be considered while preparing the lesson. Some of the criteria were the lesson should be aimed for upper level pupils and to make sure all pupils will be involved in the lesson.

Before signing off, I would like to thank Ms. Chin for giving us some brief ideas on how are we suppose to carry out the task. Ms. Chin showed us some sample lessons prepared by seniors and some master students. It was really useful. Ms. Chin also explained to us that we are supposed to come up with a lesson of minimum 5 slides due to the quarries made.