Looking at an interactive future with ActivPanels

By pc on May 9, 2018

(Last Updated On: May 11, 2018)

At the beginning of last year, Ferguson Intermediate School upgraded its interactive whiteboards to new Promethean ActivPanels – and it hasn’t taken long for them to transform teaching and learning, writes Imteeaz Mohammed.

It’s safe to say that the installation of the new Promethean ActivPanels created a great deal of excitement amongst the teachers and the students at Ferguson Intermediate School.

Each class is equipped with a 55-inch interactive flat panel display, which is being eagerly and proudly utilised for teaching and learning across all curriculum areas. Student are keen to interact with the panels, especially when they’re using some of the popular learning programs, like:

Code Avengers
Mathletics
OneNote

The ActivPanels have been supplied, installed and supported by ActiveVision, who are specialists in interactive education solutions and represent Promethean in New Zealand. The team at ActiveVision has provided outstanding professional development and onsite support to keep our staff up and running, as well as developing their skills and resources.

Medium of instruction

The devices have been quickly accepted and, increasingly, the medium of instruction in the classrooms is initiated from the ActivPanels panels, where teachers capture their ideas from the students either using ‘thought showers’, graphic organisers, or reading articles straight on to the panels. The information from the discussions are uploaded on OneNote, which is accessible on student netbooks. The students are then able to elaborate on the knowledge shared by their teachers and complete their learning activities.

Working effectively in groups

Each class has 10 netbook computers and students are timetabled to use them in conjunction with time on the ActivPanels. They can mirror their devices, so they see on their screen what’s on the main display. This allows constructive feedback on their work from their teachers. This process of screen mirroring also allows students to work effectively in groups, as well.

The teacher laptop is connected to the classroom’s panel all the time and they have the option to either ‘mirror’ their content on the panels or do a hard-wire connection. The panels are also very resourceful as they have built-in sound capability and Wi-Fi functions. This gives amazing experiences providing blended learning opportunities in the classroom.

Moreover, the resources on the Promethean website (prometheanworld.com) and the ActivInspire software are very user friendly and are a must-use tool in each of our classrooms. The teachers find these are an integral part of their teaching, aiding them to digitalise their student conferences and lesson sequences. The staff and students have access to these digitalised works anytime, anywhere in the school or at home.

Thanks to ActiveVision, the ActivPanels have changed the way we teach at Ferguson Intermediate. Looking ahead, everyone at the school is keen to explore even more, especially finding out about the Android apps available for us to use.

Imteeaz Mohammed is ICT Lead Teacher at Ferguson Intermediate School in Auckland.

Meet Promethean’s ActivInspire

This is one of a suite of award-winning software enabling teachers to bring lessons to life on ActivPanels. They combine desktop and mobile apps, plus online digital tools, to provide lesson delivery, assessment, student collaboration and game-based learning into one ultimate education suite.

activevision.co.nz/software/

Ferguson Intermediate School

Located in Otara, Auckland, Ferguson Intermediate is a Decile 1 school and has a roll of approximately 510 students (98 per cent Ma-ori and Pasifika).