Although seemingly small, the setup of Reagan classrooms have undergone big changes since late October when teaching tools were unexpectedly thrust into classrooms all through school. Promethean boards have indeed changed the way teachers and students navigate their day to day lessons in the classroom.

On Oct. 21 and 22, the school system delivered enough Promethean boards for every Reagan teacher’s classroom. Throughout the rest of October, the cafeteria was filled with Promethean boards, lined from one side of the cafeteria to the other.

After the boards were all adjusted and placed in rooms, teachers were given training courses on Nov. 4 and 5. From then on, teachers have changed the layouts of their classrooms and curriculums to fit the new boards.

So far, Promethean boards have become somewhat of a hit among teachers.

“Once I have enough time to play around with them, I can use them to really enhance lesson plans and entertain students while helping them retain knowledge on their lessons,” said history and civics teacher Bo Ogburn.

Promethean boards have become useful tools for teachers to give new ways to deliver their curriculum and their lessons. They have also been proven to benefit teachers’ curriculums.

“I’m still somewhat novice at using the boards,” Ogburn said. “But I can use the writing tools to annotate pictures of documents that I teach in history, like the Magna Carta or the 95 Theses. It’s a really good tool to present and annotate things in class in a way I really couldn’t have with the tv without messing it up, so I guess it’s a good addition to the classroom.”

Some subjects have benefited from the inclusion of the Promethean board in classrooms.

“I think the boards are really neat,” English and yearbook teacher Rebecca Martin said. “It’s a great tool for classroom management.”

Teachers like Martin, who teach more unorthodox classes such as yearbook, can use the boards for more purposes to fit their plans. Yearbook has shown to be a class where the boards have proven to be very beneficial.

“The Promethean board suits me, especially for yearbook,” Martin said. “I can now teach yearbook in a way I haven’t really gotten to yet. Before, it was where I just project the yearbook outline on the TV and had students follow along, but now I can use the board to make editing the outline a more collaborative and hands-on approach than it was before.”

Danielle Hill, English and Social Injustice and the Holocaust teacher, has made good use of her new Promethean board. 

“I definitely am glad I have the Promethean board to use,” Hill said. “In English, I use it to show annotations in literature and also correcting grammar in sentences in the annotate feature. I can also demonstrate writing papers in Google Docs with everyone in class at the same time.”

Hill also noted a comparison in the Promethean boards and the LG TVs. 

“I enjoy the Promethean boards a lot more than the TVs we used to have,” Hill said. “The old tvs weren’t bad, but with the boards, you can write things on it now and annotate the literature. You can actually show the students what they need to see and do instead of just telling them, giving them a more active job to do in class.”

 Before the installation of the Promethean boards, the yearbook was set up through every students’ individual computers. Since the board was put into the classroom, yearbook has changed into a more collaborative environment, where everyone can edit the yearbook at the same time at a place where everyone can see what’s going on.

The convenience of the boards is reaching to physical education classes. Many students in weightlifting have expressed a liking to the boards.

“I definitely think the boards are better for weightlifting,” said junior Sylas Schott. “I can finally see the workouts posted from where my rack is, which is at an awkward angle from the front of the room where the white board is.”

Now, with the inclusion of the Promethean boards, weightlifting has a more current multimedia tool.  Workout videos are accessible at any time in class, giving students a better idea on how to perform workouts more accurately and greatly decrease the chance of doing something wrong and hurting themselves. 

Having more available resources than before can offer students more ways to learn about more rigorous exercises and the benefits of performing them inside and outside of the classroom.

Although Promethean boards were at first seen by some as a waste of space, they have proven to be a useful tool for teachers to even better their lessons.

“These boards will have to stand the test of time, but I think these boards will prove to be a helpful addition to our classrooms,” Ogburn said.