How to Use Interactive Whiteboards in Your Teaching Strategy

Boost student engagement and collaboration using interactive whiteboards.

By SELIN Club | 09 Apr 2025, 04:38 AM

It’s very likely that in the classrooms of today, one finds Interactive Whiteboards (IWBs) as an essential tool to learn and teach. Enabling display and multimedia display with an interactive lesson for a student, IWBs hold a new dimension for an exciting learning experience. But just getting an IWB into your class isn't enough. Use of this technology must be embedded into teaching strategies by teachers and leaders in education.

 

By teaching them all, simply how to use interactive whiteboards in pedagogical approaches, the benefits they enjoy from it, and the best practical tips to use them to help students learn how much you can make out of it.

 

What is an Interactive Whiteboard?

 

• An interactive whiteboard is a large, touch-sensitive display which a computer or tablet connects to. It uses a stylus, finger, or other tools as input for teachers to control what appears on screen. Unlike an ordinary whiteboard, IWBs can show multimedia elements like photographs, videos, or even web pages-on-the-board, making it more engaging and dynamic.

 

• Interactive whiteboards can be found in all classes, be it in a primary school or a college. This can also be used for various subjects from languages and mathematics to science and geography. IWBs are much more than a digital edition of a chalkboard; it can facilitate hands-on learning, group activities, and a whole lot of other activities that are interactive.

   

Why Use Interactive Whiteboards in the Classroom?

Now that we understand what an interactive whiteboard is, let's read about the reasons why they are really useful for today's classroom before diving into using and integrating them in teaching.

 

1. Engaging Students

• Engaging students is one of the most valuable advantages of using interactive whiteboards. The different capabilities of presenting videos, animations, and interactive exercises can be used to capture students' attention and hold it during the lesson.

 

• You can write, draw, and highlight key points during your lessons, just like on a normal whiteboard. Use the board to illustrate concepts or display diagrams that would be hard to draw by hand. Touch functionality allows you to move objects, circle important information, and highlight text, making it easier for the student to follow along and understand.

 

2. Incorporate Multimedia

• One of the many advantages of an interactive whiteboard is its ability to be used in a multimedia display. Integrate different formats-formatting information in the lessons, such as videos, images, and animations, to make the lesson exciting. For example, in bringing historical figures to life, ideas can be shown in a video. In science teaching, use animation to show the way complicated processes like photosynthesis or the water cycle occur.

 

• Multimedia content can often help explain abstract and complex issues by making them more tangible and concrete. They offer the conceptual challenges to students while providing high-quality input (visual and auditory) that improves one's chance of involvement and retention.

 

3. Interactive Activities

Apart from the aforementioned, IWBs work excellently for interactive learning. Some of the numerous apps and software created specifically for IWBs can also be used by teachers to come up with an interactive lesson. 

 

For example, on the board, tap into activities like:

 

• Drag-and-drop exercises: Ask students to drag objects to the proper locations.
  
   
• Quiz games: Set up quizzes, and let students select the option on the board. You can even turn this into a competition to make it all more fun.
  
   
• Group brainstorming: Input time for ideas when students will be adding ideas to a collective mind map or brainstorm list on the board.
  
   

4. Admitting Students to Use the Board

• By allowing students to come up to the board to solve problems, write their answers, or even participate in group activities, one of the best uses for an IWB would be made. Not only is it more engaging, but it also builds their confidence.

 

• Student interaction with the board leads to more successful recall of that lesson, as well as greater feeling of participation in learning by each of the students. It also gives them a way to show you that they are understanding, and then get your immediate feedback.

 

5. Use the Board for Collaboration

• IWBs are one of the tools available for collaboration. Encourage your students to interact together at the board, whether it is for problem-solving as a class or a shared project. You could be planning activities when groups of students would have to come up to the board and collaboratively work towards an end.

 

• For instance, a possible example is a word problem-type of assignment in mathematics, as you would ask students to collaborate on solving it at the board. That alone fosters teamwork and problem identification and solution and exercises their critical thinking skills.

 

6. Digital Resourcing

• The interactive whiteboard can be used to organize your lesson resources in digital format. Instead of having to chance upon paper resources, you can put images and videos, documents, and links on the IWB. Then it would be easy for you to refer to these resources during your lesson, while keeping everything tidy and accessible.

 

• You can show students more than just present resources; you can use it to show resources they can refer to later, such as websites, online textbooks, or other digital learning materials.

 

7. Record and Replay Lessons

• Most IWBs have the functionality of recording lessons. This is highly advantageous in reviewing the contents of the lessons later or for those students who need extra help. In cases where your students missed lessons or would like to revisit a topic, they can watch the lesson recorded for their perusal.

 

• Recording lessons will serve as a great resource towards your teaching practice. You can watch the recordings and use them to evaluate your delivery and areas for improvement.

   

Conclusion
 

Interactive whiteboard integration can greatly enhance the experience of students learning through your teaching methods. It offers great dynamism, is engaging, and creates an interactive environment for the presentation of content material, fostering active involvement and collaboration. Properly employed, IWBs provide support for different learning styles, multimedia content, and an interactive environment for students.

 

One approach is to start small and introduce more complicated features as you get used to working with interactive whiteboards in your classroom. Keep the lessons fun, engage your students to make use of the board, and with time, you will start noticing its enormous positive effect on students' learning and engagement.

 

For additional tips, resources, and conversations about integrating new tools into your teaching, kindly visit the SELIN Club.

 

FAQ

 

1. What is an Interactive Whiteboard?

An Interactive whiteboard is a large, touch-enabled display, linked to a computer or a tablet where the teacher and learner can directly work on digital content from the board by using a stylus or fingers.

 

2. How can I implement an Interactive Whiteboard into my Lessons?

There are a number of ways to integrate a digital whiteboard into lessons, including but not limited to showing media clips, using them for interactive and participative activities, and having students collaborate in groups.

 

3. Do I require specific training for using an interactive whiteboard?

Most brand new interactive whiteboards are already very intuitive, and all a teacher needs is a little training to really make the most of the functionalities. Most IWBs come with tutorials, as there are a host of online resources to get a teacher started.

 

4. Can Contemporary Students Engage in Demonstrations using the Interactive Whiteboard?

Yes, indeed; students can interact with the whiteboard at such times to help solve a problem or answer a question through peer engagement.

 

5. So, which subjects are suitable for an interactive whiteboard?

Actually, interactive whiteboards are applicable very broadly; they can teach just about any subject. However, they are especially beneficial in subjects in which visual aids, multimedia, and interactivity can be most useful, such as science, history, mathematics, and languages.