Welcome to TeacherLed.com. This site aims to provide teaching and learning resources to make the use of the interactive whiteboard in the classroom easier and more productive. Interactive whiteboard resources are categorised on the left. New interactive whiteboard resources are below.

This interactive whiteboard resource is another where its purpose is to allow teachers to easily set a thinking skills activity for their class.  The strength of this puzzle is that it can be easily carried out on computer or with easily made pieces.  The challenge was originally set byJohn Harris and is one of the ones included in The Colossal Book of Short Puzzles and Problems by Martin Gardner.

The challenge is to start with a cube that has one face marked.  You start with the cube on the upper left square of a chess board.  The purpose is to tour the board, visiting each square once and only once, before finishing with the marked side up on the top right sqaure.  A move may be made left, right, up or down and involves rolling the cube.  The marked face may not appear face up on any move except for the start and end position.  Using the resource shows you the rules quite easily.  The skull and cross bones represent the marked side. 

The resource records the high score in each session so if you wish to allow the class to attempt this on computer you can see what their best attempt has been.  The solve button will show the solution but only if you enter the correct password in the text box below.  The password can be obtained by requesting it in the comments below.  It will not be sent immediately to prevent cheating and will periodically change so it is worth recording the solution when you have it. 

Challenges such as these encourage children to devise their own strategies and analyse the problem to reach a solution.  It is a tricky problem and students should be encouraged to not give up too soon to encourage their persistence at problem solving.  Many children fall into the trap of believing anything they can’t solve in a couple of minutes is impossible and they give up.  Setiing longer problems can help counter this mindset.  A hint that you may like to give is that the solution really only needs you to work out how to tour half the board as the second half can be done the same way but reflected. 

To make the puzzle physically use or print a normal chess board and find a cube whose faces are close to the size of squares on the board.  Or a dice may be used nominating which number counts as the marked side.

Go to Cube Tour interactive whiteboard resource.

I’d like to acknowledge the significant amout of time I saved while creating this resource by using the cube code at http://www.flashandmath.com/ as a basis for the cube used in this resource.

As detailed here there was an intention to create resources that were compatible with IWBs and iPads.  Unfortunately as detailed here technology is not at the point where this can be done at the moment.  As such this resource is aimed directly at the iPad.  It should work on Internet Explorer 9, Safari and Firefox 7 but there are so many differing possible set ups that they can’t be guaranteed.  This resource is largely a copy of the Difference Triangle Resource but with different graphics to work in a lesson I teach where the puzzle is also shown using physical pool balls. 

The challenge is to swap the pool balls until each ball is the absolute difference of the two below it.  Note the difference is always the larger number minus the smaller one.  Hence 5 and 3 have a difference of 2 as do 3 and 5.  A flashing ring around a ball indicates that it is not the correct absolute difference of the 2 below. The absence of a flashing ring shows that the difference is correct but it does not mean that the location of the ball is correct.  When all balls are placed correctly the player will be informed.

Obviously if you are able to use it with an iPad you can set it as a solo or small group challenge.  The resource can be saved to the iPad by selecting to save it to the home screen where it will perform as an app off the app store.

There is an article on how the similar Difference Triangle can be used in lessons on the supporting site to this teacherledplus.com.

Go to iPad Poolball Challenge

Please comment on the use of this resource but hold in mind that it is targetted at iPad rather than IWB.

This is a departure for this site.  Instead of being an online IWB resource this is an online iPad compatible resource.  Instead of being coded in Flash this is coded in HTML5 and so is compatible with all of Apple’s mobile devices.  It is also equally usable with the interactive whiteboard as long as you have an up to date browser.  Internet Explorer users must have IE9. 

This update of an older clock resource was chosen to allow teachers or teaching assistants to work with a child and an iPad on a 1 to 1 basis.   As such, and in line with the majority of the resources on this site, it is not designed for solitary learning but to support teaching staff help their student to learn. 

The clock is easily interacted with.  Drag anywhere onscreen to rotate the hands.  This is not restricted just to the bevel and finer control can be achieved further from the centre of the clock.  There are 3 buttons.  The top one turns on ’snap to 5′ where the minute hand will always snap to a 5 minute interval.  The middle one divided the face into ‘to’ and ‘past’.  The bottom one toggles minute labels. A deft flick of the clock will result in it spinning to a random time. 

As already said this resource is not for solitary learning but to support helping a child learn to tell the time.  As such an adult could use this to give a child the time and have the child more the hands to that time.  Or they may have the child spin the clock and then tell them the time.  Another alternative is to set the time and ask the child to advance it by another time. 

Tablet computers lack the power of desktops so not all devices will necessarily provide a suitable learing experience.  It has been tested on an iPad 2 and on and Android based HTC Desire phone and worked fine.  As such it should work fine on recent iPhones and iPod touches too. 

If your class does not have wifi remember you can save a webpage to an Apple device by selecting ‘Add to Home Screen’. 

As ever please feedback any suggestions or bug reports particularly in this case in relation to mobile devices.

Known issues:

Unfortunately browser differences can throw up surprises in a way that using Flash does not. 

Firefox is not displaying correctly please use either IE9 or Safari.

Firefox 7 works fine. 

When switching on the to/past clock face in IE9 there is a short delay as the image is not preloading correctly.  Subsequent toggling of this face is instant as the image is then loaded.

A solution to all is being worked on.

Go to iPad compatible Interactive Learning Clock.

To understand why this resource is different to the previous ones on this site see the supporting site teacherledplus.com.

This interactive whiteboard resource is another that was initially designed to form part of a space themed set of lessons.  It can, however, be used perfectly well in isolation on a lesson on angles.  Within the themed leson I give the backstory that the solar panels of their satellite have become unaligned and need correcting manually.  The resource is designed to encourage children to estimate angles.  On the left of the screen 4 values for the optimal angle of each “panel” is given as well as its error value which shows how far from optimal it is.  Tap the appropriate dial and drag the brighter of the two green lines into a position that you believe makes the angle closest to the optimal position.  Then do the same for the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.  Once all 4 panels have been set click enter.  This will show the new error rates and if necessary a fine tuning attempt can be made. 

A combined error rate of less than 20 needs to be reached for the challenge to be beaten. 

This resource can work well as a team exercise with 4 members per team with each setting one dial.  The winning team is the one that succeeds in the fewest attempts.  There is a post showing how this resource is used in a space themed set of lessons on the supporting blog for this website here.

Go to Mars Angle interactive whiteboard resource.

A useful resource to explain measuring angles is this Angle Measurer.

This IWB resource is a bit of a departure from the others and really only works as part of the Mission to Mars theme of the last few resources posted.  There are more details on how this resource is intended to work and how it fits into the sequence of themed lessons in this post on the supporting site teacherledplus.

In essence this resource is intended to challenge childrens teamwork and communication skills as part of a series of lessons themed on the a mission to mars.  It is based on the classic Lunar Lander game but requires 3 players.  One to control left, one to control right and one to control thrust. (Q = Left, P = Right and Space = thrust).  It attempts to emulate the scene in Apollo 13 where the crew each need to manually control one aspect of the craft’s controls to correct their line of travel.  In this challenge the craft needs to be landed on the spot designated by the red line.  Hazards include the gravity, the ground and the ever present threat of solar interference.

A good way to use this resource is to allow children to practise at a computer and then perform “for real” at the interactive whiteboard.  This is a very tricky challenge but is definitely possible (it is easy for a single person but used as designed for a team the challenge becomes apparent.  It requires the children to work out a clear and concise system of communication and to work as a team.  For demonstration purposes the arrow keys can be used but you should insist that for the challenge each member of the 3 person team uses can only use Q, P, or Space.

More details on this and the rest of the Mission to Mars resources can be found here.

Go to the interactive whiteboard resource.

As this is a bit of a departure from the usual purpose of my IWB resources please let me know whether you feel it could be useful for your class or, if you do try it, say how it went.  Comments can be left below.

This is the second in the series of Mission to Mars resources for use in a space themed set of lessons.  A more detailed description of how I use this resource and the thinking behind its creation can be found at the supporting site teacherledplus.

This is another IWB resource to allow you to easily build in a thinking skills aspect to your lessons.  This resource encourages children to display persistence and develop their thinking strategies as well as record progress.  The mission is detailed on the opening screen of the resource.  In essence the challenge is to visit each of the squares in the grid with the mars rover in 12 moves (the absolute minimum).  Restrictions are enforced in that the rover can only turn in multiples of 45 degrees. 

Tap a square that you want the mars rover to move to.  If it is a valid square it will move if not it won’t.  You can click on already visited squares.  Every square the mars rover explores by moving through will be illuminated.  If you illuminate all squares and return to the start using no more than 12 waypoints the challenge is completed with 100% efficiency.  This is possible but will usually require a lot of effort to achieve.  Doing it in 13 is not too difficult and their are a number of ways of doing that but 12 is a great challenge.  Ideas for making this more achievable  for all children are given on the supporting site mentioned above.

Restart will clear the current progress.  Briefing will show the mission constraints.

Get more ideas about this resource at teacherledplus.

Go to the the IWB resource.

If you need the solution please ask in the comments.  It will not be sent for a couple of days to avoid homework cheating.  If you use what is clearly a staff email address I will try to send it quicker but cannot guarantee this.

My intentions for this IWB resource are explained in more detail on the supporting blog for this site teacherledplus.com.  It forms part of a series of themed resources to support topics on space.  It can, however, be used in isolation as a quick puzzle to challenge thinking skills.

The challenge is to connect the coloured chips to each other.  Blue to blue, red to red, green to green.  The rules state that no cable may cross another cable, nor may they cross another chip, and nor may they leave the pale green bounding box.  To use simply drag from any of the 1 chips (ie B1, R1 or G1,) to any of the 2 chips (ie B2, R2, or G2).  If the connections are made without breaking any of the rules then the resource will indicate a mission success.  If a rule is broken the resource will indicate what rule has been broken. 

This puzzle will at first look impossible to many children but once they attempt it a solution is usually found quite quickly so this resource works well as a starter exercise.  Its main goal is to show children that they shouldn’t dismiss a challenge as impossible too quickly.

There is a printable sheet to support this resource here which you can hand out to allow the class to try and work it out with pencil and paper.

More information on the thinking behind the creation of this resource and how it may be employed as well as links to information on other resources within this topic are to be found here.

Go to Mars Circuit IWB resource.