TI Smart View

TI Smartview is a texas instruments computer program intended for use in the classroom. I do not get to use this much with my students, as they do not use a graphing calculator at the middle school level, but I have seen another teacher use it with the accelerated integrated algebra students. TI Smartview is an interactive, smart board calculator. In this program, the students can see you using the same calculator (for these students the TI-84) and can follow your key strokes. You can choose what screens are displayed on the board at one time. The main, and basic options I am aware of, are to have the calculator alone, which is handy when you are working with simultaneous programs such as smart notebook or internet explorer. There are also the options to use the entire smart board and keep several other screens, such as the plot screen along side the graphing screen, or the table screen along with the graphing screen. This way you can discuss the different screens at the same time, and students can see both together. There is another option to record key strokes, here the students can view all of the key strokes done by the teacher, that way they do not need to keep up, or if they make a mistake they can get back to where the teacher was. The screen capture is another nice feature, where the teacher can capture a screen and save it as a picture, this can later be used as notes, in quizzes and can be printed.
This software does not take much time to learn at all. In a single hour session, I feel that a teacher could get a very good handle on using it. This is a technology where usage is the key to making it more efficient and useful. I have seen this technology used in the classroom often, it works! Every student in the room can see what the teacher is doing, and the multiple screen views are helpful in making sure all students are in the same place, for instance they have their window set up correctly and are looking at the same graph as the teacher. I wish they made one of these for our more basic calculator, the TI30XIIS so that students could more easily follow along.