British developer Promethean announced on Thursday the release of a new product for the education market, ActivBoard Pro, and a new free online resource center for teachers, Promethean Planet. ActivBoard Pro is an upgrade to the company’s interactive electronic whiteboard, ActivBoard, that features built-in Bluetooth connectivity, a USB port, a work surface measuring 78 inches diagonally and ActivStudio 2 collaborative learning software. Promethean expects to ship the new product in August but has not announced pricing yet, nor had the company placed a product page on its Web site as MacCentral posted this article. In addition, a company representative told MacCentral that a Mac version of ActivStudio 2, which was released for Windows earlier this year, is still in development, so Mac users should make sure they receive the Mac edition of the original ActivStudio if they purchase an ActivBoard Pro.
The company also has no information on its site yet about Promethean Planet, which will provide a plethora of learning resources for use with any ActivBoard solution. Promethean Planet will be broken into five sections: Activlessons, Activforum, Activinstruction, Activresearch and Activclassrooms. Activlessons will be based on the United States’ national teaching standards and will include more than 1,000 lessons and in-class exercises covering a variety of grade levels and subject matter. Activform will provide a place for sharing knowledge among teachers worldwide while Activinstruction will offer resources for educators’ professional development training. Activresearch will include information about purchasing and implementing electronic whiteboards in K-12 classrooms and Activclassroom will serve as virtual site visits to classrooms currently using Activboard solutions.