Peabody Board
One free screen for the projector: a Quiet Garden noise meter that grows while the room is calm, clap-back attention signals, work symbols, groups, a scoreboard, timers and the day's plan, over a backdrop that follows the season. Keep up to twelve boards in your browser, with no sign-in.
How to use it
- Press Add a widget and choose what you need, or start from a layout such as Morning, Centers, Reading groups or Indoor recess. Pick a background: Auto shows falling leaves in autumn, snow in winter, rain in spring and a meadow in summer; Still stops it moving.
- Drag a widget by its title to move it, pull the corner to resize it, or use the arrow keys (Shift and the arrows to resize). Open the gear to change its settings.
- Make more boards with Boards, New board, and flip through them with ◀ ▶ or Page Up and Page Down. Press F to fill the screen. Save to file carries a board to another computer and Share copies a link; the names in your Class list stay out of both unless you tick the box.
Ideas for class
- Put the Quiet Garden up during independent work: every calm minute grows the plant, and a loud moment only pauses it. See how many quiet minutes the class banked by lunch.
- Use Clap back to get the room's attention: the board plays a rhythm while big dots light in time, and the class claps it back. Next makes it longer.
- Count down 5-4-3-2-1 on the board to end a transition; it finishes on Eyes on me.
- Show the work symbol for each part of the lesson: Silent, Whisper, Partner talk, Group talk, Ask a neighbor, Hands up, Move and share or Listen.
- Make groups from your class list on the board, dealt one card at a time, and leave them up while groups find each other.
- Keep score in a review game with the Scoreboard: big +1 and +5 buttons, and the team in the lead is marked in words.
- Keep one board per subject or per day, flip with Page Down, and save them to a file for a substitute's computer.
- Leave the Morning board up as students arrive: the clock, today's plan with check-offs, and a note that says what to do first.
- Choose graph paper or lined paper as the background behind a math or writing board.
- Double-click a widget's title to enlarge it to fill the whole board, for example the timer during a quiz.
Related
Questions
Where are my boards and my class list saved?
In this browser, on this computer: up to twelve named boards, free. Nothing is sent to our servers. The layout is also carried in the part of the link after the # sign, which the server never sees, and Save to file makes a board file on your computer that you can open on another one.
Does the link include my students' names?
No, not unless you tick 'Include names in the link and in saved files' in the Class list panel. By default a link or a file carries the layout and notes only: the class list, who was picked and the groups are left out, and scoreboard teams become Team 1, Team 2. A note you type yourself does travel, so leave names out of notes you share.
Is there a noise meter?
Yes: the Quiet Garden. Press Listen and the browser asks to use the microphone. Calm moments grow a plant from a seed to flowers; a loud moment never takes anything away, the plant just stops growing and the words say Getting loud or Too loud. It also comes as a light or a bar. The sound is measured in the browser and never recorded or sent; only today's number of quiet minutes is kept, in this browser. The Voice level widget is still there as a light you set by hand.
Does the board make sounds?
Only when you press something: the chime, the rain stick, the 5-4-3-2-1 blips, the Clap back rhythm, a pling when a Quiet Garden flower opens, and a soft tick for points and work symbols if you turn it on. M or the Sound button turns the board's sounds off. They are made in the browser; there are no sound files. Every signal is also a picture, so it works with the sound off.
Does it work offline?
Yes, once the page has loaded: every widget runs in your browser. Only the Links widget needs the internet, to open the links. A board you open from a closed tab needs the internet to load the page again.
How do I get a different layout?
Use Start from… to load a starter layout (Morning, Centers, Test day, Reading groups, Indoor recess, Clean-up) or a blank board into the board you have open, or Boards, New board to make another one. Each starter also has its own page, such as /board/morning.
Nothing you do here is sent to us. Names, lists and settings stay in this browser. No sign-in, no ads.