Week 5

Source

Promethean has teamed up to even address Common Core [learning] Standards for the board.  Only having the experience of SmartBoard, I thought that only lessons were uploaded from other teachers and meant to use only as a guideline.  Having the ability to use lessons that are built around a Common Core Standard, it means that teachers will spend less time needing to build up a full lesson from scratch.  It would allow teachers a reliable source while building from a foundation of learning versus from finding potentially poor sources (as on the SmartBoard with spelling errors).

youtube source
Multi-touch: Students can actually interact at the same time on the board.  With the SmartBoard, when someone touches another point on the board while one point is already accessed, a long line is drawn between the two.  It seems that the Promethean also allows students to write upon pictures and items, while the SmartBoard seems to only allow writing on another layer over something is shown on the main screen.  This means that when you interact with the board, the text does not translate back to the original item, but rather it stays on screen while rotating/sliding the original text.  Promethean somehow also ignores unintentional touches and other functions that would work well with a classroom.  So far, it seems that this has a greater ability in the classroom because of its consideration for the user.

My question is around the idea that with technology, it grows very quickly and already we are a bit outdated with the SmartBoard's functions.  How can we know what programs or technology to use, when it seems that with limited resources, we might be potentially spending our budget on something that could be obsolete in even less than a year.