Silverboard

A Unique and Secure Online Interactive Whiteboard

Children today are far more comfortable with computers as learning tools than many parents and carers. They are used in all schools and are the norm for children today.

At EBS we recognise that for a child to learn effectively, the learning tools must not create any barriers. So we have developed a unique digital interactive whiteboard system that works over the Internet, whilst our teachers are working with your children over the phone.

"A picture says a thousand words" is a well know saying. So SilverBoard is fully interactive and has a complete set of drawing and writing controls, to allow any maths and English concepts to be illustrated in pictures and diagrams as well as words, supporting the explanations on the phone. It can also be helpful for very young children or for Looked After Children, who can be reluctant to speak to teachers at first, but for who an electronic whiteboard is just like school and helps break down barriers.

Security is Our First Priority

Our SilverBoard technology has been specially developed here at EBS and has 3 major advantages over many other whiteboard systems used in digital education:

1. It is totally secure - only the teacher and the logged on child are able to access it and each is identified by name on the screen
2. Fully teacher controlled - actively managing the teaching and dialogue
3. No "copy" function - workings shown on it by the teacher cannot be copied and pasted to course work or homework

Secure One-to-One Access

With the concerns many parents have today about allowing their children access to the Internet and with reports of cyber bullying growing in number in the press, at EBS we ensure that only a named teacher and a single child can ever be logged into the SilverBoard at any one time.

Children can only access it through their personal online learning space, which they logon to with a user name and password. This ensures that only one child is logged in to the dialogue with a teacher and the teacher knows which child they are tutoring at any time. It also ensures the teacher has access to the correct child's checkup and Diploma results whilst tutoring them.

Teachers can only access it via the specific child’s educational record screen in our central systems and their name appears on the child’s screen, so the child knows who they are talking to at all times. So we can always see which teacher is working with which child and a teacher can only work with one child on the SilverBoard at a time. With all our teachers being fully CRB checked, parents can always be sure that their children are safe when using our systems.

Teacher Controls the Dialogue Unlike computer games, the teacher controls SilverBoard. When the child initially logs on, all the drawing and writing controls are only accessible to the teacher. They have control and decide when to give the controls to the student for them to use. At any time they can also take them back. This allows the teacher to control the progress of the teaching and to take back control if necessary, for instance to correct something a child has done or to prevent any inappropriate behaviour.

Not a “Cheats Charter”

On many Internet whiteboards, students can “right click” to copy materials from the whiteboard and then paste it into other work. In SilverBoard this is not possible, due to the technology on which it is built. Anything that the teacher or the child draws or writes can only be used on the SilverBoard. This means that children cannot copy the teacher’s example or workings to paste it into course work or homework and present it as their own.