Interactive Wall Mount Displays

1995 called, they want their electronic whiteboard back.

I don’t deny that interactive wall mount displays – smartboards- -are useful for student engagement in K-12, they provide a good platform for interactivity within small groups of students. When mounted at a low level, or on a height-adjustable mount, students can write and participate with their peers.

Are they worth the cost in Higher Ed? No.

University students don’t walk to the front of the classroom to write on a board, they sit and stare at the back of the instructors’ head while the instructor writes on the board, or they update social media and wait for the end of class.

Smartboards suffer from the same basic design flaw as the standard whiteboard, which is really just a hypoallergenic chalkboard. Chalkboards were state of the art educational teaching tools in 1801. If you place a writing surface on the front wall of the classroom for the instructor, they turn their back to the students while they write.

Interactive wall mount displays have an overlay for the writing surface, usually plastic or glass, this can become scratched, dirty and damaged. Even when new, these overlays tend to reduce the contrast and sharpness of the image. A typical large interactive display, 70”, will also be too small to be used as the only display in a 30 seat classroom. In our typical room, it would be necessary to mirror the smart display to a projector or additional displays. Sometimes this becomes a challenge, depending on the system’s design features.

Options

Interactive desktop displays have a more friendly form factor, they are usually placed on a tabletop in front of the instructor as they face the students, and don’t block eye contact. They can be very flexible and responsive. We have standardized on an all-in-one form factor PC, the Microsoft Surface Studio. It has a large fingertip-adjustable mount, and bright, sharp display. It has all of the multitouch interactivity of the wall mounted display, high quality graphics, better pen response and faster performance. The pen surface is durable and glass, easily cleaned of gummy fingerprints. It’s cheaper, as well, and the display output is easily mirrored to a projector or an external display.

Interactivity

What about student interaction for our hypothetical uber-bored University student? Most Higher Ed students come equipped with their own interactive device, occasionally kept in a pocket, usually held in the hand constantly. Bring-Your-Own-Device should be a given in University-level instruction, not an afterthought, or a “someday-we-might-support-this” option. Effort and budgets should focus on allowing BYOD interactivity in classrooms, not spending limited resources on plug-in chalkboards.