One of the things I need to do with my students each day is meet with them in small groups. During the Math small group sessions, I go over misconceptions I noticed in the work they did the day before. I have decided to use the whiteboard function of Zoom to address these misconceptions. Up until a week ago I was using my mouse to do all of the “writing” during these presentations. I did a little research during the weekend of the first week of school and found the XP-Pen Star G640 6x4 OSU tablet. At $39.99 on Amazon, it seemed like a relatively low cost experiment. I got it that Sunday and was able to get it set up for use during the second week of school. In this blogpost I will…

1. Tell you what you get.

2. Tell you how I’m using it.

3. Share some things I am liking about it.

4. Share some things I am not liking about it.

What you get…

For about $39.99 you get the drawing tablet, a plastic, battery free stylus, nibs (made of plastic) for the stylus, and the USB-C cord to plug into your computer.

How I'm using it… 

As I mentioned above, I spend a big part of my afternoons re-teaching misconceptions during my small group Math rotations via the whiteboard feature on Zoom. I write problems down and we have discussions about these problems.

Right now, this is my main use case.

Pros… 

The size of the tablet is such that it fits nicely on my desk.

I use the tablet in conjunction with the notes I've taken, in my composition notebook, from student work from the previous day’s lesson. The software for the tablet has sections that allow the user to customize the experience. For example, I disabled the toggle located on the side of the stylus. Specifically, it’s located towards the bottom, as seen in this picture.

I did this because I found that I was enabling the eraser and pen accidentally with the slightest bit of pressure from holding on to the stylus. This was getting in the way of me trying to just write. I find it easier to use the menu, on the whiteboard, with my mouse, to switch between pen and eraser. 

Cons…

One thing I’m a bit disappointed in is the fact that the tablet is tethered to my laptop via USB dongle which feels a bit limiting. I knew this going in, prior to the purchase. Even after it came in the mail I looked at it and thought, how cool would this be if I could just sit with it in my lap while working with my students via our Zoom sessions. Just 6 days into owning it the pen stopped working while I was preparing to work with a small group of students. I ended up having to use my mouse with the whiteboard which is something I was trying to get away from…I didn’t have time to troubleshoot in real time while my students were present. That had to wait until after school that afternoon. After about 40 minutes of searching the Internet, text and video, I decided to uninstall the app that comes with the hardware (tablet and pen) then reinstall. I may have inadvertently, during my first install “forgot” to follow a few of the steps. I say this because after reinstalling and testing it out…it is back up and operational. That 40 minutes spent trying to figure things out was not an intuitive experience. I was sort of hoping for a more simple, streamlined path to the solution. Again…some of that might be due to “user error.”

So what…

At $39.99 this tablet, as I mentioned earlier, feels like a relatively low cost experiment. Am I 100% happy with? Not really. Is it helping me through an important part of my instruction day? Yes. Are there other technologies out there that could do a better job than the XP-Pen? I’m sure. Should I take this experiment of using a tablet during my teaching to the next level? Maybe. Will I? Hmmmm…the year is young.