Using the interactive whiteboard to scaffold pupils’ learning of science in collaborative group activity

Interactive whiteboards (IWBs) are usually used by teachers for whole-class teaching. This paper is based upon an ESRC-funded project in which pupils used the IWB in a semi-autonomous manner when working together on science-related activities designed by the teacher. Using an analysis of video and other data from lessons in UK Year 4 and Year 5 primary classrooms (pupils aged 8-10 years), it focuses in particular on how the ‘vicarious presence’ of the teacher may scaffold the children’s learning at the IWB and influence the nature of their co-regulation of activity (by which we mean shared regulation of both cognitive and metacognitive experiences). We address the following questions: How does the teacher use the IWB to organise and support children’s semi-autonomous collaborative learning activity? In what other ways does the teacher structure children’s learning environment to support their joint activity? In so doing we address the appropriateness of the concepts of ‘scaffolding’ and ‘regulation’ for understanding the vicarious influence of the teacher and its effects on children’s activity in contexts where learning is supported by an IWB.