Interactive Touch Screens for education

Are Interactive Touch Screens for education and classrooms the future?

If you are one of the many thousands of education who are currently using interactive whiteboards and projectors, you would be forgiven for thinking that you have one of the more up to date technologies being used in your classrooms.

Advances over the last 15 years or so have seen interactive whiteboards take on a new dimension with more power, comprehensive software and ultra short throw projectors that have almost, although not completely, eliminated shadows.

Are interactive touch screens for education the answer? The world has not stopped and advances in the consumer field have led to a revolution in television screens making them "smarter". LED technoogy has not only permeated into all forms of lighting, but is now also heavily used in the production of TV screens. LED lamps are not just greener, but have a considerably longer life.

It was therefore just a matter of time before such advances saw themselves incorporated into "interactive" TVs or interactive panels or interactive touch screens as they have now become commonly known within the education sector

Thus started the development of Interactive touch screens for education and other training and presentation environments. Until quite recently, this technology was seen as out of reach of schools due to its disproportionate cost. However, with mass production, costs have come down to the point where Interactive touch screens can actually work out as low as, and in some cases, lower, than the cost of an interactive whiteboard and projector setup.

1. Projectors project from the front and, invariably, a shadow is created on the screen while teaching. At the same time, a light being beamed at the board is likely to affect the teacher, even if in a very small way. Interactive touch screens are lit from the back and both the above two problems are eliminated.
2. All projectors have their own throw ratio, determined by the type of lens used. Thus, to replace a projector on an existing installation, one needs to ensure that the replacement has a similar throw ratio to avoid moving the mount. More often than not, the earlier installed mounts tend to get replaced with either short throw mounts or ultra short throw mounts.
3. Projectors have their own limited life. Thus either the screen or the projector has to be replaced after a certain amount of use. Further, the lamp life on a projector is in the region of 3000 hours. LED Interactive touch screens, on the other hand, not only offer similar warrantly periods, but have lamp lives in teh revionof 50,000 hours, which is almost 20 times that of a standard projector bulb.
4. The better Interactive Touch Screens come with toughened anti-glare glass, thus eliminating the strain on the eys for both teachers and students.
5. With a whiteboard and projector setup, every time a projector is installed or replaced, it needs to be calibrated with the interactive whiteboard. With Interactive Touch Screens, this step is altogether eliminated.
6. Interactive Touch Screens have many other benefits, but a significant last but not least of the benefits, particularly for infant and primary schools, is that Interactive Touch Screens can be mounted at any height. The height of an interactive whiteboard, on the other hand, is determined by the height of the projector, which can not be mounted too low for health and safety reasons.