Collage: A Presentation Tool for the K-12 Classroom

We present Collage, an application designed specifically to support a K-12 teacher in a classroom equipped with a single PC and a projector. Initial ethnography of schools suggested that a tool that offered simplicity, enabled display of images and allowed incorporation of existing paper material (such as textbooks) would be most helpful. So, Collage is at heart a simple media viewer, but adds a handful of features that allow teachers to interactively display textbook materials during instruction. The only significant “competitor” to Collage is PowerPoint, which despite its non-education-focused heritage, has penetrated an impressive number of schools. In our 3month field deployment, teachers reported that in comparison to PowerPoint, Collage was easier to use, took less preparation time per class, and enabled the kind of impromptu flexibility they sought during class.