Lightboard – teaching innovation at its best

SALT Seminar: Lightboard in Engineering


I attended the first seminar of the SALT series ‘7 characteristics of a Good University Teacher’ delivered by Dr Richard Cobley and Dr Karin Ennser. This was an inspirational session to show how the Lightboard has been used for developing high quality teaching material.

What is Lightboard ?
The Lightboard is a glass ‘chalkboard’ embedded with LED lights. Users write on the glass surface with fluorescent markers while their teaching session is recorded, resulting in highly visible sketches and equations. Capturing the user ‘in action’ means that they can draw and write in a natural way, facing the camera. The results? Good quality video without post-production editing.

How Lightboard has been used in Engineering and Welsh

Lightboard videos capture a combination of hand-written board writing, PowerPoint slides, overlaid videos, graphics and close-up live demonstration. Unlike lecture capture the board writing and material appear in front of the presenter so are not obscured during delivery, enabling a more interactive approach. During the session Richard and Karen shared a range of ideas for utilising Lightboard, encouraging staff to create videos for:

  • additional support material (a ‘one off’ investment)
  • exemplars of specific challenges/ problems
  • students to revisit content
  • engagement with a topic pre/post lecture

You can see the video of Richard and Karen’s session by clicking here.

Who can use it ?

Lightboard is available to ALL university staff wishing to record teaching material. Please email eng_lightboard@swansea.ac.uk

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