Monday A delivery van arrives with two new interactive whiteboards. The driver asks whether the caretaker is able to help him unload. Mandy says the caretaker will not be back until 3pm. The driver asks if she will help him to unload and carry them in. She looks at how big they are and thinks not. The driver says that he will lift them down and leave them outside.
Mandy points out that it is raining. The driver says he will take them away then. Fine, says Mandy.
Tuesday The same driver returns. Jim, our deputy head and ICT co-ordinator, has release time. He, too, looks at the well-wrapped boards and says no, he doesn’t feel that he should be unloading such expensive items. Would it not be a good idea for the driver to bring along a mate? The driver disappears again with our whiteboards.
Wednesday The boards are due to be fitted today. The driver arrives, with support, and they’re unloaded into the entrance hall. The fitters arrive.
Marilyn takes her Year 2 class to the Year 6 classroom (they’ve gone to the museum) so that the fitters can replace her blackboard with an interactive whiteboard.
Thursday Our adviser is in school to carry out a teaching and learning audit. Jim takes his class to the Year 2 classroom (they are away visiting the museum). He has prepared a lesson for the adviser to see on control, using the interactive whiteboard. It doesn’t work. He demonstrates a very good lesson based on thinking on your feet using children to model the movements of a turtle.
Friday Jim demonstrates the whiteboard to the staff. It works really well when you switch on the projector! He shows us how to access material - it’s very exciting. The second whiteboard is fitted into Jim’s class with no problems. Marilyn’s class would like a blackboard fitted back please. The children are missing it already
Val Woollven is head of St Andrew’s C of E primary school, Plymouth
