Schools begin replacing chalkboards with marker boards

WASHINGTON -- When architects turned a former Safeway grocery into a public charter school in 1999, they ditched the dusty chalkboards.

Instead, each of the 17 classrooms at the SouthEast Academy of Scholastic Excellence got a glossy whiteboard and set of colored markers -- to the delight of special education teacher JoAnne Anthony.

"I love it because I have allergies and I don't like chalk," said Anthony. "I don't like it on my hands and on my clothes."

While the old-fashioned chalkboard remains a fixture in most U.S. classrooms, school designers have all but eliminated it. Taking a page from the business world, they're outfitting most new and remodeled schools with whiteboards, in some cases installing high-tech devices that turn them into virtual computer screens.

Teachers can surf the Internet in front of class, save and print out lessons or even create animated diagrams that students can review on a home computer.

"It's helped us to teach the way we've always wanted the class to go," said Albert Throckmorton, director of curriculum technology at Episcopal High School in Alexandria, Va.

Even before such gee-whiz devices came along, educators say, the chalkboard was on the way out, killed by computers. Chalk is compressed dust, after all, and dust is the enemy of computers. To a lesser degree, schools also worry about dust allergies.

Nancy Myers, an Indiana school planner, said that people in her firm "don't even consider chalkboards in most cases" and that schools like the modern, businesslike look of whiteboards.

Teaching tool

The dust-and-computers problem might be a bit overblown, she said.

"The truth is, unless the computers are sitting right on top of the chalkboards, there isn't going to be an issue."

First used widely in the United States in the mid-1800s, the schoolroom chalkboard was itself revolutionary, replacing the handheld slate as schools began educating large numbers of students, said Peggy Kidwell, a curator at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History.

While the popularity of plastic-coated whiteboards took off in the 1990s, these days most are actually made of the same stuff as chalkboards -- a thin coating of porcelain over steel. Chalkboards get a satin finish so the chalk will bite, while whiteboards get a glossy finish.

A few companies have turned whiteboards into oversize computer screens. One company sells a $10,000 plasma screen that teachers can use to project images from a computer -- the teacher's hand becomes the computer mouse on the touch-sensitive screen.

For about $3,500, schools can buy a device that allows teachers to draw on a board, hit a button and print copies on a laser printer -- or save text and drawings to a hard drive or Web server.

An even cheaper device simply sticks to a whiteboard with suction cups, each of its four markers fitted with a computer stylus. The mimio Xi, manufactured by Massachusetts-based Virtual Ink Corp., saves words or drawings stroke-by-stroke into a computer file, allowing teachers to create a digital movie of a lesson. Students can download and review it using a VCR-like program.

Help with handwriting

Even with such advances, said Henry Ruggiero, president of New York Blackboard of NJ, a major blackboard manufacturer, teachers often plead with him not to replace their chalkboards. The grit offers just enough resistance for writing.

"It seems to help the children with their handwriting," he said.

Indeed, a common complaint of whiteboards is that they're so slick students end up writing faster than their brains can think.

Ohio industrial designer Sandy Kate said many teachers simply like the feel of chalk. She gives chalkboards five years at most -- making for a brighter, whiter future, but without the simple joy of clapping dusty erasers on the side of the school building.

"I do wonder what's going to happen to all the youth who were sent forward to clean erasers," Kidwell said. "That always seemed like a good use of youthful energy."