Whiteboards were championed by the education sector before being widely used in the business sector. They are also used at home to run the family schedule, to-do around the house, or home office, and an alternative surface for children to drawn on. They are even used in Hospitals!
They were sold as a better alternative to chalkboards because they were easier to read, better for student and teacher health, and lightened the classroom. Their black text on a white, or light background is more legible, especially when there is a lot of information to copy down, this may be because the black marker does a better job of stopping the reflecting light, than the white chalk, whose coverage is not completely opaque, and is absorbed by the black background.
The dust from chalkboard is thought to stir allergies in children, early whiteboards didn’t clean much better than chalkboards, but once the dry erase whiteboard marker was invented, whiteboards started to take over.
In 1937, a revolutionary White Blackboard was tried in Elgin, Illinois. It was made from painted glass and used a compressed carbon pen as a marker. The comments from this were that it brightened the classroom, stopped the eye strain of looking at a blackboard, and improved the mood of the students.
Most, if not all, companies today will have a whiteboard in their meeting, or boardroom. They have been used to replace paper in many businesses. Any workshop, or team event where you working as a group, there will be a whiteboard.
We have worked with many companies that have opted for a stick-on whiteboard, over a traditional board whiteboard in their break-out rooms and meeting rooms. The install is quick, and silent, doesn’t create any dust, suits the modern aesthetics of the corporate workplace. In our boardroom, we have a 1200mm x 1200mm Think Space in Yellow! And 2 of the Goal Dots in Mint. We use the Think Space for general brainstorming and ideas, whilst we use the
In our business, we use whiteboards to replace the mountains of notebooks and loose paper that we record to-do list on. We each have a Think Space on our desk to write down the most important things that need to be done. Then we set about doing them.
In Hospitals, whiteboards are used to record patient in formation, and they have a systemized layout which indicated whether the patient can be fed, and how they can be fed, what assistance they will require and other important details. We were recently in the hospital. It is a 24/7 operation. Multiple shifts, so many different professions, from doctors and nurses to chemists and orderlies. It’s important that this information is clear and has a hierarchy, as many different staff need to reference it for something like this, we would recommend you contact us through the custom order tab, and we’ll work with you to get the right solution.
My physiotherapist uses them to write out people’s exercises, the patients take a picture and have always got the exercises on them. They made a clear choice that they would be paperless as they believed it was a better alternative. I know myself; I am not good at managing paper. Some people are regimented and have an inbox and an outbox, others have stacks of paper which are not ordered, however, they will know where something is and can find it, given enough time, usually… I fit into the second category. I’m not good at managing paper, so I decided that a new system was need. When something came in I would read it, decide whether it was important, if it was I would take a photo, if it needed action, I write it on the Think Space on my desk, and if it is not important, I throw it in the bin. This kept my desk looking tidy.
Whenever there is teamwork, or you need to illustrate an idea to a group of people, there is a whiteboard, or at least there should be. Whiteboards are an incredibly simple, yet effective tool for communicating an idea, they allow quick iteration of ideas, you work through one subject, wipe it clean, and then move to the next, or leave it on there for next time.
In the home a stick on whiteboard on the Fridge or kitchen cupboard can be very helpful for organizing a family’s actives for the month. It’s a quick visual reference so everyone knows what’s happening when and can stop double booking.
We use our WriteWall as a shopping list on the side of our kitchen cabinetry, it goes from floor to ceiling. The top is often used for the myriad of work that needs to be completed around the home, like, fix the back fence, spray the garden, organise concrete for the front driveway etc. The middle is a shopping list. As soon as we run out of something, it goes on the list. All we must do is take a photo before we go to the supermarket.
Our daughters love to draw on everything. Be it important documents on our desk, a piece of paper, or our whiteboards. We have now laminated the surface of our eldest daughter’s little table with a WriteWall in Powder Blue, she loves drawing on it! She even loves erasing it and starting again. It’s been interesting to see how her drawing changes from lines, to squiggles, or as she says, helicopters, now to an endless W’s, or M’s, depending on where you start.
As you can see, whether it is at school, the office, or home, or home office, whiteboards are being used to communicate and notate. There will be many other professions and groups of people who use whiteboards that we have missed out. If you are one of these groups, please let us know we are always keen to hear how they are being