The years passed by. The Internet came towards the end of the 1990s. Things started happening. All of a sudden the classroom got access to the world. This brought a completely new dimension to learning things. We started using computers every now and then as a new tool in the classroom.
In 2007 I got a question from the principal at my school, "Would you be interested in having a new board, a SMART Board, in your classroom, because we have some extra money that could be spent on it?" "A SMART Board?? What kind of board is that?" But I was curious to know more about it, so I said "Yes!" I have never had to regret that!
After the SMART Board was installed in my language classroom, a new way of teaching and learning saw daylight. Instead of teacher-centered lessons, where the students just sat on their chairs listening, reading and writing, it was now very easy to vary the lesson activities, to collaborate with the students, to inspire them and above all to make them more active in their own learning process.
At an early stage I realised how good a tool the Notebook programme is, i.e. the software that is designed for the interactive use of the SMART Board. It is such a good programme with all the different pens, colors, shapes and pictures to insert and do lots of things with. Not to mention everything that is available for you in the Lesson Activity Toolkit, all the interactive things in the Gallery and ready-made lesson material that you can find if you log into websites like KouluOn (in Finland), Smartklubben (in Sweden) and SMART Exchange (world-wide).
During the fall of 2014 I took part in a SMART education training course in Vanda, Finland, that was arranged by a company called Aronet. I learned so many new things about my SMART, for example how to use 3D objects and add-ons like Extreme Collaboration, SMART Maestro, SMART Blocks... I have now started helping other teachers at my school to use their SMART Boards (we have a total of five boards at my school) in a more interactive way than before. It's so fun and I really enjoy my new "spare-time job"! In October I was nominated to become a SMART Exemplary Educator for Finland and in November the dream came true! I have begun to understand what a large thing SMART is world-wide and how easily you can get support from colleagues all around the world if there is something you want to know or need help with.
Today, I can't imagine a school day without the SMART Board. It has become such a big part of my lessons and it makes the learning process diversified in a very nice and interesting way.
