The Power Of Interactive Displays In The Classroom: Cloverdale Unified School District

Renee DuVander – Instructional Tech and Mathematics coach 

Located in the northernmost part of Sonoma County, the mission for Cloverdale Unified School District is to engage, challenge, and nurture students according to their individual needs. Aiming to expand their student’s ability to think critically, communicate effectively and solve problems creatively. 

For Renee DuVander and her peers, this means ensuring classrooms are equipped with the right technology to modernize teaching methods and support student development. A Mathematics teacher for over 15 years, Renee has seen technology come and go throughout her district. She understands the critical part it can play in how teachers plan and execute their lessons:  

Life Before DisplayNote

Before DisplayNote was introduced to Cloverdale, Renee and her peers had ways to screen share, but they limited the outcomes of the lesson: 

“We only had the document cameras and overhead projector. If I wanted a student to come up and show their work, they had to come to sit at my desk and write on paper.” 

While this served its purpose, it limited the development and practice students got in presenting their ideas to the class and at times interrupted the flow of the lesson.  

Student Becomes The Teacher

When DisplayNote Screen Sharing and interactive displays were introduced, it gave teachers and students the opportunity to share ideas and present like never before: 

“Now students can bring their working paper up to the board with them, but they are working problems out on the display, for others to see them work it out. Students are able to pause them and ask questions, just as if they were the teacher. Pause them and ask them what, why and how they did a certain step.” 

For Renee, DisplayNote helps capture student’s attention, creating powerful exercises that shape how students present their ideas and rationalize their work:  

“It allows students to justify their work, and kind of live in the moment. Instead of students escaping that and just throwing their paper down under the document camera and saying – this is what I did and leaving it at that.” 

New Strides In Creating Student Platforms

Thanks to DisplayNote Screen Sharing, Cloverdale can facilitate portfolio nights for students to get in front of their classmates, parents and community members. Creating opportunities for students to present with confidence and develop essential skills to help them progress in all areas of life:  

“It’s just really amazing to see these presentations and how far we’ve come. We’ve done these portfolio presentations for the last 20 years, but what they look like now compared to what they looked like before is just amazing.” 

One reason these portfolio presentations are so successful, is how easy it is for students to connect and prepare to share their work:  

“The students come in, I put the DisplayNote session ID up on the screen and the students who are presenting log in on their Chromebooks and get queued up in the lobby. Then I just invite them to present when it’s their turn.” 

The Power Of Interactive Displays

The Cloverdale team are a forward-thinking school district, that understands the importance technology can play in both teachers and students’ development. With DisplayNote, solutions are often embedded within Interactive displays, elevating the toolkit available to teachers and students alike. 

Renee, who’s been a passionate technology enthusiast for many years, had this to say to other teachers and districts thinking about including DisplayNote screen sharing and interactive displays into their technology offering: 

“It’s a really exciting opportunity to expand your teaching and your classroom. I was nervous when the displays first came in, because it was such a dramatic change. But the displays, and the image quality is out of this world. And the ability to write and interact with the screen changes the game.” 

“It allows you to interact with the lesson in a way we’ve never been able to before.” 

For us at DisplayNote, we’re proud of the part we play in supporting Cloverdale School District in their mission to nurture, engage and challenge students. Giving each classroom the tools to create a student platform to share ideas, communicate and think critically.