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How important is a blackboard in the classroom?

Blackboards combine visuals with lectures to better engage students. At the same time, they provide a workspace for teachers and students in full view of the classroom, making them one of the most valuable tools in a classroom.

But what if blackboards could interact with students, teachers and other available technology?

Annunciation Day School (ADS), located at 2500 Clairmont Road NE in north Decatur seems to answer that question through the Promethean ActivWall, a digital blackboard offering touchscreen capabilities and student-laptop connectivity. Each classroom in ADS, ranging from kindergarten to sixth grade, utilizes the technology for a more immersive learning environment.

Parents and ADS officials were taken to three classrooms on May 17 to see the ActivWall in action.

The first, headed by teacher Arielle Kontoes, demonstrated the wall’s ability to engage students in digital pictures and maps by having students place pictures of animals, plants and landscapes in appropriate Georgia regions. Every student in the classroom was able to use the board at once before watching a video about state wildlife on the same screen.

In the same way, the ActivWall combined all types of media to pass along knowledge about former United States president Jimmy Carter in Alexia Mookas’ classroom. Here, students sat through a lesson and video before filling out digital worksheets, diagrams and Q&A’s on laptops. Students also approached the board to write and erase information with digital pens.

From the laptops, students submitted information to be displayed on the ActivWall, allowing Mookas to discuss, commend and correct each piece of work.

“This is fun!” exclaimed students while comparing work.

“This is fun and exciting,” Mookas said in response.

ADS substitute teacher and parent Daysi Nicolaides said the ActivWall provided a much needed environment for the modern student. Nicolaides said students would in all likelihood learn more at a faster pace due to the ActivWall’s presence.

“It’s a fun way for kids to learn things; it’s something new with a new form of technology, which they’re all about,” Nicolaides said. “It will get their attention more.”

Nicolaides said she looks forward to seeing results from working with the ActivWall from her first- and fourth-grade children. The parent-teacher said she has heard other teachers talk about sharing their work.

“It’s something cool and different,” Nicolaides said. “I sub here a lot. Teachers who are being trained on [the ActivWall] come back from training and tell me ‘Look what I learned!’ and students will ask me ‘Can we work on it?’”

According to ADS principal Peter Epstein, the ActivWall has been catching the curiosity of students since the school’s Spring Break in early April. Epstein said the board exemplifies the school’s goals of providing science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (STEAM) instruction, building character and project-based learning.

“We saw one classroom taking students through the engineering design process,” Epstein said. “One of the lessons was based on Jimmy Carter and the Carter Center and asking kids about social responsibility. One class will create a brochure showcasing different regions in Georgia.”

Epstein said ActivWall helps foster ADS’s deeper goal of fostering leadership, affecting the community and helping others. The principal said this will be furthered in future collaborative projects with Georgia Tech.

“The ideas teachers are able to get across through integrating web links into their lessons and interact with essential questions allows our kids and teachers to do a lot of cool things,” Epstein said. “It allows them to learn in very different ways and interact with one another.”

Epstein said Annunciation Day School is leading the way in technology by using the ActivWall and fostering an ideal educational environment.

“There are so many things we can do with [the board] to support the learning taking place,” Epstein said. “The teacher is the leader in a classroom but it’s important to realize technology is supporting what we do. It can be used in so many different ways.”