Triptico - tools for the Interactive Board

One of the main things I am trying to improve at the moment is the use of the interactive boards around the school. These are pretty expensive pieces of kit and it makes me wince to see them being used lesson after lesson as a very pricey flat surface to project onto. Of course, there are times when you are just showing some data or a news article when this is fine but there are some tools out there which can really enhance their impact in the classroom. Both tools I have already blogged about, Thinglink and Quizlet, are good examples but the focus of this post is another great tool called Triptico.

The first thing to say is that Triptico is not a single tool to be used in a particular topic, it is a whole suite of apps which will improve a whole host of things that you already do in your lessons.

Let's start with some of the simpler ones.

Timers

By far, the tools I use the most are the various timers. The circle timer is usually my go-to option but there some other goodies like a flip timer and an egg timer in there as well.

Simply set the time you want and press start. At a glance, the pupils can see how long they have left in the activity. I have used it for short, thinking time of 30 seconds or so and longer, writing time when it comes to examination practice.

Names

Another staple task of the teacher is choosing individual pupils and groups. There are, of course, times when you want to keep a tight reign on groups and pick on individual pupils when asking questions but if you do want to go down the route of randomising then the Flip Selector (left in mid-flip) and Student Group (right) tools have got you covered. Set up a simple list of pupils names in a text file and import the class you need. Flip selector will pick a single, random name and the group tool will allocate all names into groups. You can decide how many groups you want. There are a couple of extra lovely features as well like the ability to eliminate absent pupils from the lists and choose random pupils within each group. The examples shows a class of 20 in four groups with two pupils selected from each group.

Flip Selector

Group Selector

Spinners

Two spinner tools (a free, text-based one and an image one as part of the 'Plus' tools) are great for adding an element of randomness into the classroom and making pupils think on their feet. The one below is used when teaching market failure. Pupils have to identify the nature of the failure before follow up questions on diagrams, interventions or definitions.

Image Spinner

Interactive Tools

There are a host of other apps (23 in total) if you sign up to the plus package for £15 (well worth it) which can really bring your interactive board to life. I'm not going to go through them all but here are some with specific uses in Business/Economics teaching.

The Card Board is one which I find particularly useful for things like definitions. One side of the board is displayed and pupils have to give the answer which can then be shown on the back of the card. Below is how I have used this for ratio analysis. 

Card Board

The Order Sorter is an excellent tool for developing the sequences of analysis in both subjects. The image below shows the steps used by the ONS when calculating the rate of inflation. Pupils need to come up to the board and drag the items into the correct sequence.

Order Sorter

I have found that using the Triptico tools have really increased the value of the interactive board in my lessons. I would say that I use at least one of the tools in most lessons, even if it just the timer. Recently, I have started to use several apps together such as the ratio analysis activity example above which, in full, goes as follows:

1. Set up the score tapper to keep track of points
2. Use the group selector to create the groups and select random pupils from within the groups to answer a question
3. Use the card board to make the pupil identify the relevant ratio (for one point)
4. Use the text spinner to pick a follow up which the pupil can attempt to answer by themselves (2 points) or with the help of their group (1 point)

That went on for a fairly sizeable chunk of the lesson but I was really pleased with how engaged the pupils were and the extent to which they could recall the information.

I would say that Triptico is unlikely to revolutionise your teaching but I don't really think that it the point. It allows you to do a host of activities you probably already do but in a more organised and interesting wa