Getting SMART (notebook)

 This week I've finally downloaded my own version of SMART notebook onto my home PC. I have it on my school PC, but find I prefer working from home than at school - have more time to spend on work without getting distracted (which I do rather easily).

So, having installed it on my home PC, and having a fair bit of time to play around with all the features and create some of my very first notebook files here's what I've done and used in class this week...in terms of notebook: [some of these will be pretty basic, others hopefully a bit more advanced?]

Circle Theorems notebook...(Year 10 set 2)

• inserted text and pictures to create some 'Mathematical DINGBATS' (more on these later - see future posts)
• used the line tool and circle tool to create a circle theorems' question. I then produced copies of this image and then layered loads of different parts of the questions over the top of the original. The original I locked in place using the 'lock in place' tool and then I was able to drag the various parts of the question out to show the class what angle facts we could use to answer any question posed looking for any missing angle.
• inserted a link to a web page - so I could show the class various theorems on GeoGebra
• used the pen tool to colour in angles in different colours to highlight those that were the same, those that added to 180 degree or those that were half/double another
• I saved my ABCD Plenary slides so that they can easily be copied into future notebook files
• I used the record function and transparency function to record the GeoGebra activities as we went through them in class so that I could e-mail them to students for future revision

Nth Term notebook...(Year 10 set 5)

• inserted text, images and shapes - the shapes I used to 'box out' various parts of the slides that I wanted to uncover at various points in the lesson
• I used the screen shade tool to, again, uncover various parts of the slides as the lesson progressed
• I used the 'dual display' tool to show up on the IWB 2 slides at a time - this was so that I could differentiate the class' tasks and give them the choice of whether they did the right or left hand side
• (my personal favourite) I used the pen to draw on white text over the answers to the questions I had written on the board. I then, after the class had completed the questions, revealed the answers using the IWB rubber - I just rubbed off the white text! This created the illusion of me 'magically' revealing the answers just by rubbing the IWB - the year 10s loved this (as did I)!

Averages notebook...(Year 8 set 5s)

• Apart from the above, I used the table tool to create a simple table to show the definitions of mean, median, mode and range for the class to use as a reminder
• Printed off slides for the class to use to write down the example as I was doing it on the board - rather than writing out all of the information on the slide themselves

This coming week I have Scatter Graphs and Constructions to teach to different year groups/classes and so will be looking at ways I can use notebook to show these clearly - more to follow on these. I have briefly looked at the 'Mathematics' gallery on the software and hope there will be plenty on here that I can use in future too.