Ideas for the classroom

Using the interactive whiteboard creatively in primary language lessons

Using ICT in primary language lessons can be extremely motivating both for children and teachers. When used effectively, ICT can add variety and interaction to a lesson. Teachers will also be able to draw on software packages for linguistic support, as well as for stimulating, lively visual resources to support understanding. ICT can also bring the world into the classroom, showing children that the new language is being used by real people across the world and giving them the opportunity to explore countries and cultures virtually.

The interactive whiteboard

The interactive whiteboard is a key feature of today’s primary classrooms. Typical software accompanying the whiteboard can be used very effectively during language lessons to present and consolidate language, manipulate language, annotate text and pictures, tell stories and play games.

Making visual resources can sometimes be quite time-consuming; software for the whiteboard can be a great timesaver for the busy teacher. Images from whiteboard programmes or from websites can be used to introduce or consolidate language in stimulating ways. For example, when teaching the topic of clothing, the spotlight or reveal tool can be used to practise vocabulary, as children say the name of the item of clothing they can see, or guess what will come next. To check understanding, children could then be invited to come to the board and ‘pack’ a suitcase on the board by dragging and dropping items into the case, whilst listening to instructions from the teacher or another child. This activity also works really well with pictures of dolls or children which the child then dresses up.

The whiteboard can also be used to introduce and develop knowledge of the written word. Asking children to match a word with an image is an excellent way of developing word recognition. The timer tool can be used to add an extra challenge to this type of activity. Spelling of single words can also be practised using the drag and drop technique to create words from single letters. Words can also be hidden by placing a shape on top of them or covering them with the pen tool – children can then be asked to attempt to spell the word and then to check their spelling with the newly uncovered version on the board.

Using the whiteboard as a springboard for partner work to develop children’s sentence building skills and knowledge about language is also effective. An activity can be modelled to the whole class before children then repeat the activity in pairs. For example, you might ask children to move words on the board and put them into the correct order to make a meaningful sentence. This allows time for a whole class discussion to clear up any misunderstanding or to highlight points of difficulty before children begin working independently, using word cards.

You may also find it useful to use the pen and highlighter tools to annotate text on the board when editing a text as a whole-class. This works really well when identifying the success criteria for a particular activity. Equally, modelling ‘Two Stars and a Wish’ before asking children to work together in pairs can be very effective when done on the interactive whiteboard.

You may want to focus on a grammatical detail, for example gender, and ask children to sort words into columns on the board. The layering technique can also be used here to show clearly when a word is in the correct place. For example, you could have a blue square containing the word le. If you then designate all le nouns to the top layer, when children drag them onto the square they will remain on top and thus children will be able to see straight away that they are correct. If all la nouns are designated to the bottom layer, then they will automatically seem to slide behind the square when you or a child tries to drag it on to the square.

Children can be very motivated by seeing themselves on screen and photographs can be very effective in many different contexts. When storytelling, pictures could be taken of children doing freeze frames from different scenes of the story. Once photographs have been uploaded to your computer, the camera tool on the whiteboard can be used to transfer pictures to the flipchart page, where you can then use them for shared writing, either by adding speech bubbles or text. The story can then be enjoyed again and again and shared with other classes. You may want to embed sound into the story, either by inserting sound files that children have recorded themselves, or by using some of the ‘ready-made’ sounds that can be found in the resource bank of the software package.

There are so many ways to use the interactive whiteboard creatively in a primary languages lesson. Of course, as with all lessons, it is important to make sure that you are using it to enhance teaching and learning and not just for the sake of it. But when used effectively, the whiteboard can be extremely stimulating and motivating for pupils and teachers alike.

You can find many more ideas for using ICT in primary languages in We have the technology! (Young Pathfinder 14)