IWB's - a mystery to me!

I'll put it out there - I do not understand why people would use an IWB. I had one in the mid 2000s and never used it as an interactive board.

To honest I didn't see the point.

Sure, I've read the literature. I just feel like I am missing something.

And now, with the push for 70"+ interactive televisions and the subsequent cost...

You see, the reason I don't understand IWBs or why you would replace them with an interactive TV is just this. They are not student centered learning.

There. I said it. I'll wait for the howls to settle down. However, to partly prove my point just Google IWBs and see how many promo images look like this:


That's right. A teacher out the front doing what she/he would have done before. That's the 'S' in SAMR.

So I'll be clear... I don't like a board in any sense, black, white or interactive. I have no prejudices, I hate them all.

I don't like a 'front' to a room.

I don't like fixed single learning spaces.

I'm one of those types.

Give me a room with no front or back, with modular furniture and a sense of the unexpected.

Give me noise and chaos and students taking ownership of the learning.

Give me multiple learning spaces, both physical and digital.

And when those DI moments have to occur, change them!

I have been lucky enough to teach in a 1:1 environment for the last several years and here is my response to DI:

• If DI is known and can be planned for, it has no place in my room. Good chance it is only remembering and understanding. Flip it and get it out of here. 
• If DI is ad hoc or pro re nata , it is important and necessary. Good chance it is applying, analysing and evaluating. Use a collaborative learning tool already in the student's hands (I like OneNote) or software to assist (e.g LanSchool). 

See - no front of room required. Sure, a whiteboard is handy (Office Lens straight into OneNote) but it doesn't have to be at the front of the room. It doesn't even have to be a whiteboard - butchers paper, giant Post-it notes and even gloss paint or glass surfaces will suffice. 

In a 1:1 environment I just don't understand a 'front of room' concept. And with almost all our secondary classsrooms now 1:1, why are we going that way? 

Someone let me know what I am missing? Please!