Easy to Set Up and Use

Airtame products are designed for ease of use. You can have an Airtame device up and running in minutes, and the intuitive interface means that educators and students can start sharing their screen in no time. IT admins save time with an intuitive interface for users, and simplified management, such as remote updates.

Wireless Sharing at Its Finest

With Airtame, educators and students can screen share wirelessly, eliminating the need for cables and making content sharing easier. Educators can easily switch between presentations and videos, and students can show off their work to the class with ease. Fewer cables mean less equipment needs replacing – helping to slim your IT budget.

Compatible with Everything

Airtame is compatible with commonly used classroom devices, from Windows, macOS and Chromebook, to iOS and Android. Users can cast their screen with the Airtame app, through a web browser or via the standard native protocols Google Cast, AirPlay or Miracast (Powered by ). This means that no matter what tech your educators and students are using, they can share their screen with ease, making communication simpler than ever.

Digital Signage to Transform Spaces

Want to display schedules, news updates, or an emergency alert on screens around the school? Enable instant communication of important information to students, staff, and visitors with highly customizable digital signage that’s easy to create and deploy. No need to print new materials or manually distribute them around campus.

Centralized Management

Control each Airtame device from a single dashboard with Airtame Cloud – it’s easy to update software, adjust settings, and keep an eye on usage and performance. Organize Airtame devices into groups according to their location (e.g. specific building on campus) or function (e.g. classroom vs. meeting room). The Cloud account owner can invite multiple members of staff to join, assign certain user roles with different permissions and access levels. This means, you can assign someone else to manage your digital signage, without risking them tampering with any networking settings.

Secure

Security is likely a top priority for your school, and Airtame products are designed with this in mind. We use the highest level of wireless security available, WPA2 Enterprise encryption, and can be configured to meet your school’s security policies.

Reduce Support Tickets

Minimizes stress, as device performance can be monitored regularly from the Cloud. This reduces the number of support tickets, which means IT admins can focus on other important tasks.

Budget-Friendly

Airtame products are affordable, making them a cost-effective solution for every school. You can purchase multiple devices and use them throughout the school, creating a comprehensive wireless screen sharing and digital signage solution without breaking your budget.

To sum it up, Airtame products are an excellent choice for IT administrators in educational institutions for wireless screen sharing, digital signage, and more. They’re easy to set up and use, compatible with all devices, centrally manageable, secure, and affordable. By incorporating Airtame into your school’s technology infrastructure, you can simplify your workload – and your faculty, staff, and student body will love it too!

The post Tech Made Easy: Top Ways Airtame Solutions Simplify IT Management in Schools appeared first on Airtame.

1. Wireless Screen Sharing

All Airtame solutions allow you to share your screen wirelessly, eliminating the need for cables and adapters, making it easier for you to present information to your class. No longer tethered to a desk or podium, you are empowered to roam around the classroom and check-in with students in a more natural way. As Instructional Technology Coordinator of Warren Country Public Schools, Matt Kresslein, can attest, “We have transitioned to TVs with the Airtame platform, which has freed our teachers to move around the room as they lead digital lessons delivered wirelessly from mobile devices. This has proven to be far more impactful than standing in the front of the room while students use their Chromebooks.” It provides students with the opportunity to ask questions and receive tailored 1:1 support, without needing to pause a lesson midway through. You can wirelessly share your screen through a web browser, through native protocols such GoogleCast, Airplay, and Miracast, or through the Airtame application (which brings added functionality, such as the ability to share wirelessly to multiple displays at the same time).

2. Improved Student Engagement

With Airtame, you can bring your lessons to life and engage your students in new and exciting ways. You can share videos, images, and presentations to your display, making it easier for students to follow along and understand the material. Wireless screen sharing allows students to share their work to a central classroom screen, making group presentations easy, and fostering feedback from their fellow peers.

3. Encourage Active Learning

Active learning involves students learning by either enacting or explaining the subject matter to their peers. With Airtame’s bring-your-own-device policy, students can connect to Airtame from almost any device, including Chromebooks, Macs, Windows, and Linux computers, as well as iOS and Android devices. This cross-platform compatibility facilitates active learning, allowing more students to present in front of their class or larger groups and makes Airtame perfect for both 1-to-1 and BYOD environments. Moderator mode lets educators and other staff members disconnect anyone from Airtame, giving you the power to allow screen sharing and disconnect students when needed.

4. Promote Educational Messaging

In addition to providing wireless teaching and presenting, Airtame also provides digital signage options for your classroom display. Airtame Cloud enables the setup of a single image or website, a welcome message, and screen sharing instructions across all Airtame-enabled displays. You can also showcase various multimedia as digital signage, such as student projects or artwork, class schedules, upcoming sporting events, daily cafeteria menus, and more. Leverage your digital displays to promote health and safety guidelines throughout your classroom and common areas. Here’s what Warren County Public Schools had to say about Airtame’s digital signage: “Airtame has empowered us to share district-wide signage and videos, such as the student-created projects we displayed during Digital Citizenship Week to celebrate students’ digital agility and safety.”

5. Aid Punctuality

Use the Room Overview feature in the Airtame App to synchronize with your school’s Microsoft or Google Calendar and create a timetable, which can be displayed in hallways, break rooms, cafeterias, libraries, and other areas. You’ll also save time with Airtime’s wireless capabilities, eliminating the need to search for cables.

In conclusion, Airtame products are an excellent solution for educators who want to simplify the use of technology in the classroom while creating the perfect learning environment for student engagement. With features such as easy wireless screen sharing and digital signage, Airtame can enhance your teaching experience, save you time and effort, and improve your students’ learning outcomes. As Rob Cover, Assistant Manager – School Technology Operations for York Region District School Board states, “These devices are all about providing a classroom environment that is more engaging, and richer for learning. Does the product enhance or ease the classroom environment? In both cases, it does just by virtue of its connectivity and agnosticism. It simplifies display technology for the teacher, which enhances the curriculum and the teaching”. By leveraging Airtame’s capabilities, you can create a more interactive and dynamic classroom environment that will benefit both you and your students. So why not give Airtame a try and see how it can make your life easier as a teacher?
 

The post 5 Ways Airtame Products Can Revolutionize Your Classroom appeared first on Airtame.

We are firm believers that technology has a place in the classroom and can be an empowering tool for educators.

What are the rising edtech trends and their use in classrooms? We’ve dug deep and researched the movements on the rise, and here’s how we predict classrooms changing in 2019 and beyond.

Curious for more trends? Check out our predictions of how the contemporary workspace will change in 2019.

Edtech trends

BYOD brings people together

From laptops to tablets, to smartphones and Chromebooks, schools and universities everywhere are embracing a dynamic learning environment, where students bring and use a computational device of their choice.

It’s called BYOD or Bring Your Own Device, and when schools acknowledge that the technological companions are a part of our everyday lives, it becomes easier to implement and use them to the educators’ advantage. Sourcing the best devices would come at an immense cost for schools, so a BYOD environment is a good idea to overcome that hurdle.

We believe more learning environments will increasingly embrace the BYOD trend along with exploratory BYOD-driven projects that let students participate more actively. Our wireless screen sharing solution is platform-agnostic, which means it’s well-suited for these BYOD environments too.

Freedom to roam

A more mobile environment is a more dynamic environment, and going wireless is one step educators can take towards a more dynamic learning space. Educators can operate their laptop or tablet from anywhere in the room with wireless AV gear, like Airtame.

In a more dynamic environment, educators become more flexible, allowing them to instruct to the class and help individual students at the same time. It’s an area we’re definitely going to see more schools exploring in the coming year.

Safety through signage

Ensuring a safe and secure campus is no easy task, but digital signage may be the answer. Digital signage will enable instructors to update emergency alerts in real-time. Emergency messages could include wayfinding, information updates, and procedures.

Good thing is that many schools might not even have to invest in a lot of new gear to reap the benefits. If the school is already outfitted with displays in critical areas, it’s only a matter of acquiring the right software.

Smart classrooms become smarter

Previously, chalkboards were an integral part of the traditional classroom. Today, interactive whiteboards are the new standard along with a list of other smart solutions. These smart solutions give educators a lot more freedom – and probably also time.

We’re at a point now where teachers can do automated attendance, share content instantly with students, and not have to stay tethered to the front of the classroom. It brings about more interaction, not only student to teacher but student to student as well.

Luckily, many of these smart solutions are becoming more affordable and easy to access even for schools on a tighter budget. Besides that, the evolution of smart technologies for the classrooms is still on the rise, so we will definitely see more of them implemented in 2019.

Teaching trends

The benefits of gamification

A smart classroom puts students at the center and connects them to the space itself via their laptops, smartphones, and tablets. It’s called “active-learning classrooms” (ALC), and more schools are implementing these smart learning spaces.

In an ALC, students are more actively engaged, they participate through discussions and reflections rather than being only passive listeners. ALCs are on the rise, and we think more schools will put an emphasis on that.  

Another way to make the learning environment more active is to introduce gamification. Gamification ensures a certain level of interaction from students and in some cases heightens comprehension rates because the games can be tailored to the individual class or student. Read about more benefits here.

More classrooms are going “green”

The modern classroom not only focuses on edtech and active learning solutions; it’s also sustainable and eco-friendly. Of course, not every classroom will immediately be able to adopt a sustainability program, but there are several things instructors can do to make simple and efficient changes.

It’s called “The three Rs”: reduce, reuse, and recycle. With so many technological advances, reducing waste shouldn’t be so challenging, seeing as we’re already connected to cloud platforms and sharing a lot of content online. A lot of the work that has previously been done on paper can easily be transferred to computers.

The key to implementing a more “green” structure is a supportive administration in the school, and a city-wide infrastructure. Recycling at school becomes easier if students are already recycling at home and ditto for their parents at work.

Robotics and coding are not as alien as they sound

Coding shouldn’t be limited to a special type of learner. Today, everyone can benefit from learning how technology works and how it works with the wider world.

Teaching coding and robotics in the classroom is a brilliant idea that helps stimulate computational thinking.

With our online presence being so dominant in the Digital Age, we believe teaching coding activities, programming, and robotics will help prepare students for the modern, technological world. Coding could soon become a new mandatory ‘language’ in school.

Recognizing the individual

Each student is different, and so is their style of learning and interest in various subjects. Advanced, technology-assisted instructions allow for more personalized learning. Educators already have a good idea what each student’s preferences are like, and with the right tools, they’ll be able to tailor the learning experience to exactly fit the needs and interests of the individual, making learning more fun – and a lot more effective.  

Personalized learning is especially beneficial for special needs students with impairments that would cause them issues in a traditional setting. With adaptive and personalized learning, kids with hearing or visual disabilities, dyslexia or anxiety can have tools to express themselves in a way that’s suitable for them.

Drive learning analytics with AI

AI isn’t a replacement of human intelligence, it’s more a support tool that can be very helpful for instructors. For example, the data collected in classrooms can be used to tailor the learning experience going forward – and what works best with the set of students in front of the instructor.

AI could mean automated grading, which in turn means more time for other things. AI could also mean better and more immediate feedback for students, better research, and a better understanding of each student’s individual need.

Classroom culture trends

Focus on ethics, data, and privacy

Data protection needs to be top of mind in 2019 if it isn’t already. Just as we share data involuntarily all the time, so do students.

It’s not just important for the younger kids in school, older pupils and instructors need to be mindful of how they use their data – and when they’re protected.

The same goes for the online presence we inevitably all have. We think schools will play a more active role in addressing responsible technology use and online behavior.

Collaborative learning

In an ALC, collaborative learning is very much encouraged. It means an environment where students are encouraged to work together to solve problems and reflect on the topics presented.

Through project-based learning, gamification, and sharing content, students can participate more freely. Students can more easily find their own voice in the classroom in a collaborative environment and thereby figure out how they learn best and what they still need some support with.

Learning is for teachers too

It’s no use trying to implement fancy new technologies if the instructors don’t feel comfortable using them, so the right training can make all the difference.

AV gear should support the instructor’s teaching efforts by making their presentations effective and easy to understand. Instructors need to be educated enough that AV tools can be put to good effect.

The right training will strengthen the instructors’ skills in making their teaching process effective, attention-grabbing, and interesting. And if done right, it will foster more collaboration because students will be able to weigh in on the content shown. That’s why, even before looking into AV gear, schools should have a plan for how to prepare their educators.

Smarter classrooms are more inclusive

Each student is unique but most curriculums are not. It’s extremely challenging for an educator to come up with personalized learning tools for each and every student. That’s where the right technology can be of help.

Not only will smart technologies free up time that the teachers can then spend on supporting their students, they also help support students in finding out what their strengths are and how best to apply them throughout their education.

Airtame is such a tool, and it can help encourage many of these trends as it brings both students and teachers together in presenting when and where they want. For the uninitiated, take a look at the opportunities of Airtame in this quick video (or watch the longer Airtame for education demo here).

Did we miss anything? What do you think is in store for edtech trends in the coming year? We speak to hundreds of educational institutions every year, and we’d love to hear from you too.

The post The top classroom and edtech trends in 2019 appeared first on Airtame.

These concerns are matched with the rise of active learning classrooms (student-centered, technology-rich learning environments). This is a relatively new movement within Higher Education that’s slowly but surely transforming the way students learn and teachers teach. But it hasn’t always been easy finding the right, high-end technologies that live up to the standards of active learning classrooms at a sustainable price.

Steven Fudally, Chief Information Officer at Lake Superior College, came up with the “$1k classroom upgrade” in answer to this challenge – easy to use, high-tech tools at cost-effective prices that will turn classrooms into active learning spaces.

In just one month, Lake Superior College managed to roll out Airtame in 90 classrooms. They found that Airtame provides the kind of essential and dedicated education solution that they had been searching for – and at an affordable cost.

The bare minimum of an active learning space

It was a concept to challenge my team to research and identify modern technology at cost-effective prices for producing a collaborative and flexible academic environment.

Steven Fudally, Chief Information Officer at Lake Superior College

Steven Fudally came up with the “$1k classroom upgrade” because technology is finally at a point where it’s possible to find a smart solution that isn’t outdated immediately and doesn’t cost an arm and a leg. Finding the right tools takes a lot of research, and that’s why Fudally put a lot of effort into finding exactly the right match.

Simply put, educational institutions need an environment and set of tools that allow them to teach effectively. Teaching is challenging, tech should be simple. The tools and tech should be easy to use by everyone and cater to all sorts of room and a BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) environment.

For Lake Superior College, the original assessment was to find a replacement cycle of 7-10 years. They thought this was too slow to keep the academic setting competitive. So ideally, Lake Superior College would establish an academic setting with a 3-year replacement strategy, and in order to obtain a shorter replacement strategy, they realized they would have to decrease the cost of the classroom and improve wireless utilization – without jeopardizing quality.

Flexible, collaborative, cost-effective, financially sustainable, BYOD-friendly… That’s a lot of demands, but the fact is that those are the bare minimum requirements most Higher Ed institutions are faced with.

Luckily, educational environments are at the benefit of working with committed local resellers, who are in turn committed to getting the very best prices for mass tech deployment. The ongoing relationship a procurement or IT admin has with a well-educated AV reseller, who knows which solution would be perfect for the school’s specific use case, makes it a bit easier to find the kinds of cost-effective, modern technology solutions that will last for a long time.

The right technology = better learning

At Lake Superior College, about 80 percent of all rooms were in analog mode before they came up with the $1k classroom upgrade. Choosing what and where to upgrade wasn’t very straightforward for Lake Superior College, Fudally and his team focused on upgrading the rooms where the majority of students would benefit from a quick turnover.

A $1k classroom upgrade was impossible to obtain, Fudally found, if it had to include all the right cables, adapters, and controls for all teachers and students. Because a collaborative learning environment should factor in the students too and whatever device they are able to bring.

The hardwired cabled connections to support all would not only be a physical hassle to set up and maintain, it would be an added expense too. That’s why they settled on a wireless streaming solution.

We wanted to produce an environment where the system adheres to the environment rather than people adhering to the system.

Steven Fudally

Wireless streaming transforms teaching

Unfortunately, many of the wireless streaming solutions on the market were unreliable, causing lots of manual intervention, increased help desk support, and not fulfilling the BYOD demand.

It wasn’t until Lake Superior College found Airtame that they believed they had found the ideal solution. At a sustainable cost, Airtame provides the modern, easy to use solution they had been looking for.

Setting up Airtame was actually so easy for Lake Superior College that the entire training occurred in less than a week for approximately 250 faculty. They were able to implement a “train the trainer” solution, which meant that in no time they had champions offering to help training other faculty.

Faculty and students can bring in their own computing device and present from a platform they are comfortable with. This now eliminates the awkwardness of finding files, plugging in cables, and running devices they are unfamiliar with.

Steven Fudally

The problem that many educational institutions face is not the ability to find such modern technology solutions that fit their needs; it’s the cost that comes with it. With technologies like Airtame, classrooms can be instantly transformed into active learning spaces – and for a fraction of the cost of other solutions.

Key factors to consider when looking for tech gear

Flexible, collaborative tools for active learning are not impossible to find, and not all are priced too high to meet educational institutions’ budgets. But finding exactly the right ones require a lot of dedication, research, and trusted resellers.

From our partnerships and feedback, we’ve come up with a few key points that educators and IT admins should consider when establishing tight AV budgets and rollouts for active learning:

• Outline your cost
• Factor in the student cost (not just that of the teachers)
• Think about your AV life cycle
• Consult teachers’/students’ boards (better than an IT admin simply assuming new tech is good for a classroom)
• Focus energy and cost where you can see the quickest and largest impact (this should also help with the budgeting of a wider rollout)

Would you like to upgrade your classroom? Watch this short video and find out more about how Airtame works for your school environment:

Read more about Lake Superior College, and discover how to rollout Airtame for your educational institution.

The post The $1k classroom upgrade appeared first on Airtame.

We try to make things run as smoothly as possible for our partners who use Airtame but, sometimes, implementing a new technological tool can be challenging. Getting deployment right depends on everything from leadership to staff and student engagement and quality training.

In order to help you make the most of Airtame in your educational setting, this article outlines everything to take into account — from the preliminary questions to consider before purchase, to ongoing processes for maintaining Airtame, and re-training key staff members and keeping your student body engaged. Your school will be up and running with wireless streaming in no time!

Looking for a step-by-step guide on mass deployment? Take a peek here. And here’s a quick overview of Airtame:

Make sure that investing in wireless technology is the right choice

Before investing in a new technological solution, make sure that you have asked yourself these relevant questions that will uncover whether this is the right choice. These can involve anything from budget considerations to which computers and displays are most commonly used.

You should also be sure that people want the change. No decision should be made before taking into account the preferences and concerns of educators and other staff members. IT administrators must also be involved to ensure that deployment will be realistic from a technical standpoint.

Do your research to see if Airtame is the best match for your particular needs, by taking into consideration how it compares to other solutions (check out our comparison articles here).  Even when you feel confident that it’s the optimal solution, double check that the requirements for using Airtame can be met.

We understand that funding can be tight, which is why we run a 30-day risk-free trial, to give you peace of mind, and to help offset any uneasiness about investing in a specific solution before getting to test it out first-hand.

Still in doubt? Let’s talk your questions through in a demo call. Don’t have the time? Check out our recorded Airtame for education demo:

Install and configure Airtame

Perhaps you will buy 40 Airtames for your school or institute – or perhaps you will buy 400. You may be using Airtame for a television or projector at the front of a classroom, or in a hallway, lobby area, or assembly hall. Whatever the case, the initial setup will require some planning.

First, think in advance about how you want to power the Airtames (i.e. through the USB port of your display or with the AC adapter that comes in the box). You could also use a PoE (power over Ethernet) solution for your devices. Consider the physical layout of each room, and whether or not the chosen setup can be accommodated.

Second, take into account if the devices will be at risk of theft, and physically secure them according to your judgment.

Third, consider an efficient labeling system that will be used for each Airtame based on its location (e.g., Biology Lab, Lobby Left, Classroom 24, etc.). Later on, you can save the same name on the label to a given device’s settings.

Fourth, plan how you will configure the devices. Configuration refers to how you will connect Airtame to the local network, and the settings you will turn on for each device (e.g., Pin Code Connect, Password Protection, Resolution, AirPlay, etc.).

Many educational settings have various groups of people who’ll want to present wirelessly—teachers, students, parents, guest speakers, etc.—and they’ll all need access to Airtame regardless of which network they’re on.

Start streaming – and test, test, test

Once you have physically installed and configured Airtame, it’s time to start streaming! We highly recommend having students, teachers, and IT administrators stream to Airtame from the various platforms used with your environment (be they Chromebook, Mac, Windows, Linux computers and/or iOS and Android mobile devices).

You can share your computer screen to one Airtame-equipped screen, or to multiple screens at the same time. During testing, judge image, video, and sound quality when streaming different kinds of content.

You can always reach out to our support team if you encounter any challenges. We also have a help center with articles to help guide your IT administrator (and everyday users) each step of the way. During this phase of testing, it may be useful to:

1. Test your Airtame setup to make sure each device is detectable.

2. Calibrate your display for the best possible image quality.

3. Test and improve streaming: including audio and video streaming.

4. Test and improve your WiFi network for better overall performance.

4. Get your devices on Airtame Cloud

Airtame Cloud, used for the easy management of your screens is available at https://airtame.cloud/ and is completely free. You simply set up a Cloud account with your work email, and then start adding Airtame devices to the platform. Once this is complete, you will be able to monitor and make changes to devices even when working remotely.

Cloud management is great for ease of use when it comes to the mass deployment and upkeep of dozens or even hundreds of Airtames.

One-on-one changes can always be made to an individual Airtame through the Airtame app, such as in the case of a teacher wanting to update something specific for a particular class. The Airtame app is handy for the everyday user, and Airtame Cloud is the best possible way for IT administrators to monitor performance and manage settings throughout the entire school.

One Airtame customer, Lake Superior College, has seen support tickets drop by 80% since deploying Airtame. This is due to the efficiency that Airtame Cloud, and other features, can provide when deployment is done right.

Get rolling with digital signage

When no one is streaming to Airtame for a class presentation or meeting, it can be used to show an image, website, or custom dashboard. This lets you make the most out of the displays that are already in use in classrooms or public spaces throughout the building, and can easily be updated via the Airtame app or from Airtame Cloud.

You could display the school’s website or its logo along with a welcome message to visitors on career day, or you could have the class timetable shown when students are working on independent assignments. You could even show a clock ticking down the time until a test is over, or an image of a famous painting as the backdrop of an art class.

Administrators can use Airtame Cloud to instantly display relevant mass communication (related to fire drills, directions for guests, or other public service announcements) across a building or entire campus. There is a multitude of ways to use signage to make a learning environment that much more safe, organized and inspiring.

Teachers and other staff should have a way to either update this content themselves, by having access to the device settings (which can be password locked), or, alternatively, there should be a simple forum for requesting that the relevant administrators update digital signage on an ongoing basis through Airtame Cloud.

Train teachers – and students

Training teachers and students will be an essential part of making the most of the devices. Showing people what they can do with technology, that they could not do previously, is the best possible way to demonstrate value. Meaningful change can only occur when this is realized in the long-term.

A single training session won’t be enough to ensure that old habits don’t kick back in soon after. Ongoing workshops and one-on-one sessions with an instructional technologist can help to sustain steadily increasing use of all the different features of Airtame.

While individual instruction is effective, a complementary learning tool is to have a landing page that gives everyone an overview of why you’ve chosen Airtame, and how it works.

A great example is this one created by Boston Public Schools who have taken a special initiative to take full advantage of their investment. Our team is of course always happy to assist over the phone, and by offering written instructions such as our printable guides and help center articles.

Continue updating, teaching, and learning

Airtame is a living product, meaning that we’re continually working on improving the user experience and product in order to help you use your screens better.

The Airtame Cloud platform offers a centralized and efficient way to make sure that all the devices are up to date. Ensuring quality control is also made easier by staying in touch with Airtame’s support team, in order to learn about relevant developments as well as get answers to any questions or concerns.

Airtame can help unlock more collaborative learning, one teacher, and student, at a time. With a steady influx of new educators and students, it’s important that training is ongoing, and that everyone has the time to peacefully move into a new method of teaching, and learning, in an increasingly wireless world.

If you have questions or need assistance with setting up Airtame in your environment, please get in touch via:

• Our live chat at www.airtame.com
• Email at support@airtame.com
• Booking a call

The post Things to consider when rolling out Airtame in schools appeared first on Airtame.

As education strives to become less teacher-centered, classroom teachers are ditching traditional teaching practices and classroom set-ups for more student-centered approaches. The trend of flexible seating is becoming increasingly popular in which students can choose where to sit and have more opportunity for movement throughout the day. I recently created a video, Classroom Cribs, in which a second-grade teacher took me on a tour of several different classrooms in her school. Click HERE to see how today’s classrooms are being set up.

Flexible seating

Gone are the days in which the teacher stands in front of the room lecturing and having students absorb information from a textbook. Chalkboard and marker boards have been replaced with interactive boards, document cameras or projectors. All of these changes help promote personalized learning experiences and engage students in a more collaborative learning environment as they work together to explore academic concepts.

Shy and reserved students now are capable of participating in classroom activities thanks to a variety digital tools and apps that allow for anonymous interaction, typed responses as well as recorded videos that can be created in a private atmosphere. Students with attention issues are having their needs met by having interactive, personalized lessons delivered straight to their working area, available within an arm’s reach, thanks to digital devices.

Educational technology has made its way into classrooms and is providing rich learning experiences and opportunities when used effectively. What was once a problem of not having enough access to technology in schools is morphing into not having enough professional development for teachers to keep up with the latest technological advances that are needed to equip children for their future.

There has been a shift in more digitized lessons which provide more opportunities for differentiation. However, I am a huge advocate of what is known as “blending learning” in which educators incorporate traditional teaching practices with web-based learning. As children are growing up with technology both at home and at schools it has been reported that a deterioration of their motor skills has resulted due to too much touch-screen time and very little time spent learning how to hold a writing utensil. Moderation and variety are key for classrooms of all ages and abilities.

Practically every study circulating around the internet reports that future employers will be looking for certain skills that pertain to what educators know as “The Four C’s”: communication, collaboration, critical thinking and problem-solving. Therefore, we have seen coding and programming make its way into the classroom, even in the primary grades, to help facilitate critical thinking and problem-solving.

Augmented reality and virtual reality are appearing in more and more classrooms to bring real-life learning experiences to students that they would never grasp just by reading a textbook. 3D printing in the classroom has exploded as students are learning how to design and print models that can help solve problems or simply bring concepts to life in the palm of their hand. Students are being exposed and expected to use collaborative workspaces like Google Drive, OneDrive and other digital tools to work together in a digital environment. STEM/STEAM and project-based learning are becoming increasingly popular as well to help our students understand what it means to be an engineer.

Today’s children are beginning to create an online presence at a very early age. Therefore it is crucial that educators and parents reinforce the importance of what it means to be a responsible digital citizen. Curriculum for digital citizenship is making its way into the educational setting and continues to expand. Cyberbullying, online safety, digital privacy, digital security, digital reputation as well as self-image & identity are among the many topics that are being addressed in today’s classrooms.

With all of these advances happening in education it is vital that educators embrace these changes to prepare their students for what lies ahead. Aside from academic concepts, students need to learn, practice and master skills that will mold them into successful communicators, collaborators, critical thinkers, problem solvers and creators.  After all, educators and parents have the important job of preparing students for their future jobs–jobs that haven’t yet even been invented.

The post The future of classrooms appeared first on Airtame.

Technology in education is no longer a question of whether we should use it or not. Now, educators and district leaders are asking: How can we stay ahead of the curve?

Campus Vejle is one of the educational institutions that take action to keep up with the latest trends in technology. Part of their strategy now includes Airtame in their digital classrooms.

About Campus Vejle

Campus Vejle is a larger educational institution made up of multiple campuses. They not only offer high school degrees with a business focus, but also adult education and specialized preparation for university and college degrees.

It’s located in the central part of Denmark and houses more than 2,500 students on a daily basis.

One of the school’s core values is to be at the forefront of digital learning. The IT manager describes their digital strategy as:

Rebellious – in a good way. We want the latest in technology. Therefore, it’s natural that Airtame has made its way to our classrooms by now. – Jan Andersen, IT Manager & Purchaser

Watch the video below to hear what Campus Vejle has to say about Airtame (video is in Danish, so be sure to turn subtitles on!):

The IT department of Campus Vejle oversees equipment in more than 200 classrooms spread out over its multiple campuses. At the business high school, they have a central IT hub from where they configure their networks, prepare IT hardware, and manage their Airtames.

Campus Vejle’s environment

Most of the classrooms are equipped with whiteboards and short-throw Epson projectors. A typical classroom on campus can fit around 30 students, but there are also designated areas for group work and auditoriums for larger audiences.

The value of wireless classrooms

When we asked the students and teachers at Campus Vejle what benefit Airtame brought to their everyday campus experience, they replied that it does more than just replace cables. It actually opens up a platform for two-way communication between students and educators.

The end result is more dynamic teaching.

It completely changes the way we can teach and interact in the classroom. Now, I can easily have a student show me and the rest of the class how they solved a specific problem. In two seconds, they can share the image from their own computer onto the classroom projector.

Lars Therkelsen, Teacher in Mathematics

Fewer worries and faster workflow

The students and teachers at Campus Vejle noticed right away that a wireless screen sharing solution helps them work more smoothly.

There is less time wasted on switching between students during presentations. And students who previously had problems sharing their work because they didn’t have HDMI ports are now free to fully participate in the lesson.

I think it is a genius idea! It saves us a lot of time in class. Often when we have presentations, it takes a long time for each student to connect and we often encounter problems with connecting through the HDMI cables.

Emil Bilde, Student

Simplicity is Key

One of the challenges when going wireless is that it does require students and teachers to learn a new way of connecting to the screen. It is therefore vital that both educators and students have a wireless solution that is simple to learn and easy to use.

This idea is a key factor in Airtame’s design process and our team works continuously to simplify our product and user experience.

Using it is very easy. All it takes to get going is three simple steps. I haven’t seen any students having difficulties connecting to the projector with Airtame.

Thomas Carstensen, Teacher in Innovation

Using cables was a huge pain for us. Connecting to Airtame just worked. When watching videos, we had no issues with audio and it is easy for different people in a group to quickly connect.

Emil Bilde, Student

Saving money, while supporting BYOD

Going wireless didn’t only make the workday easier for students and teachers. The people in the IT department also saved time and money by exchanging cables for Airtame.

Having a wireless solution lets us save money. The screen cables often break or go missing, so getting rid of those is a big advantage for us.

Thomas Steinmeyer Dresler, IT supporter and Network Admin

On top of that, Airtame also makes it possible for students to bring their own devices and still connect to the school’s equipment. This fits in with the school’s overall digital strategy, which supports a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) classroom.

There are two benefits of using Airtame: Firstly, we save a lot of time and money on exchanging and maintaining the cables and adapters that we used to have in our classrooms. Secondly it is much easier for us to enable the students to connect as they are bringing a range of different devices. – Jan Andersen, IT manager and Purchaser

Airtame setup at Campus Vejle

Campus Vejle has installed the Airtames directly in their classroom projectors. The Airtame receives power directly from a wall plug, so it is easy to manage and configure the devices from the central IT hub without having to go to the room and turn on the device.

Network integration

Campus Vejle has two separate wireless networks. One wireless network is for students, teachers and other staff, which is protected with WPA2-Enterprise authentication. Every student and teacher has a unique username and password that they use to log on to the school WiFi.

The other network is an open guest network for people who don’t have a user account at the school to connect to.

At the moment, the Airtames are connected to the “teacher and student” network. The Airtames are wirelessly connected on the 5GHz frequency band and the second wireless antenna in the Airtame is disabled in order to reduce interference.

This ensures both good streaming performance and a secure setup, where access to the internal network is limited to students and school staff.

Campus Vejle’s network does not currently have “Multicast” or “Broadcasting” enabled on their network. This means that students and teachers connect to the screen using the IP address displayed, when no one is connected.

The plan for the future is to have the Airtames appear directly in the software menu when students and educators open the Airtame application. Our upcoming Pin Code feature will ensure that no one is able to connect to a screen if they are not in the same room.

Airtame’s new Cloud Platform

Campus Vejle was given an early preview of Airtame’s upcoming Cloud Platform, which would make it easier to manage multiple Airtames without ever leaving your desk.

We’ve seen the Airtame team’s Cloud Platform. Already now I can see the value of being able to control all our Airtames from one central place. Having them connected to constant power, means it is easy for us to manage them without having to go to the individual classrooms.

Jan Andersen, IT manager and Purchaser

To sum things up

Overall, Airtame has helped Campus Vejle boost interactive teaching and collaboration. IT administrators saved time and money spent on cables. And both students and teachers can now bring their own devices to the digital classroom.

Airtame is a product that has evolved immensely since we first got it into our hands. It often get’s updated and we can see great progress and improvements every time.

Thomas Steinmeyer Dresler, IT Supporter and Network Admin

Airtame is a great fit for Campus Vejle’s strategy, which embraces new technology to create a more modern education. Fortunately, the journey doesn’t stop here. Airtame will continue to evolve and with upcoming features like the new Cloud Platform and Pin Connect, life for IT admins is only going to get easier.

If you’re ready to make the switch from cables to Airtame, write to us at sales@airtame.com!

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