Where do I want to be with my Promethean skills?

It is a couple of days after Christmas and the break is half over.  When I left my classroom last Friday they were in the midst of installing my Promethean board and the room was a disaster.  I am anxious to return sometime this week just to clean up and arrange my room with this new awesome technology.

As soon as I return I want to become proficient in the use of the PB.  In my experience it is best for me just to dive in and start using it.  I often project images of our class blog or wiki so I can demonstrate how to do something or show a really good comment from a student.  I see myself doing simple things like this initially just to get used to using it and for my students to get used to seeing me use it.  There are great interactive math sites that I can use on the board I can also use initially.  Then I am anxious to begin to plan with the PB in mind.  I want to write math or science lesson plans as PB files so that there is much more interactivity in my classroom.  I think it would be ideal if the students were using it as well, but with the SmartBoard, it was very difficult to have more than one student at a time use it.  Some thoughts for math and science:

•  Interactive manipulatives for math using EM Games or the Virtual Manipulatives math site.
• Math warm up - Putting a system in place where I put my warm up on the PB and begin my lesson there.
  
• Science videos with students circling key parts that demonstrate a concept.
• Class created files throughout a science unit beginning with KWL, adding concepts, ending with key points, vocabulary.  This way, when I want to teach it next year, I have a document of what I did.
  
• Virtual Science Notebook?
  

Where are you now with your Promethean Skills?

I am very excited to have a Promethean Board in my classroom.  Actually, it isn't in my room yet.  It is being installed the Friday before winter break.  A sly ploy to try to get me to visit my classroom when I should be on break?  I don't know, but I normally do not look forward to the end of a break.  In January however, I will be eagerly anticipating the opportunity to begin playing with my new Promethean board.

The boards are being installed in mine and 5 of my colleagues classrooms as we speak through a Morgridge Family Foundation Matching Grant.  I have agreed to 45 hours of training in the next year so that I can get up to speed.

Over the last two years, I had the pleasure of having a SmartBoard in my classroom when I taught at Alsup Elementary School in Adams 14.  I suspect that the Promethean Board is very similar to the SmartBoard, but I am anxious to figure out the differences.  The Promethean board I am getting is much bigger than my SmarBoard was.  It also has a fixed-mounted projector at the top of the board, which makes it much more stable, and much easier to stay out of the way of the projection.  My SmartBoard had to be re-oriented several times during the day because of the projector getting bumped.

I will be contributing to the DPS Promethean Blog and Promethean Users Wiki throughout this process so that participants (100 or so) can share ideas and lesson plans.  Many more updates to come...