When I was hired five years ago, I inherited a classroom that still had chalkboards. I actually grew quite fond of them. Despite the pedagogical issues that come with just standing at the board showing problem after problem as a good portion of the class fights the weight of their eyelids, there was something about the feeling of filling up those chalkboards with formulas and computations. A sort of opus of mathematics for the nerd in me.
Two years ago, I finally (and somewhat reluctantly) had my chalkboards replaced with whiteboards. However, the better addition I had in my classroom was individual desktop whiteboards on which students could all try problems and easily share work and answers with me and their peers... a bit more collaborative.
Now my students all have laptops, and the progression continues. We can now use Microsoft OneNote in class for a lot of the same purposes. In addition, we explored a number of online virtual whiteboards in class that allow for sharing and collaborating. Quite an improvement over the chalkboard.
With that being said, I found that most of the free online whiteboards left a lot to be desired, especially in the user-friendliness realm. Even with OneNote, the writing tools are cumbersome at best, unless working on a tablet.
Luckily, I do have a tablet. I can't imagine going back to chalkboards!
There is something to be said for the physical-tactile media of chalk. I don't miss the dust, but somehow there was something more intuitive about the ramblings that I scrawled all over a chalk board and then the community of students who would smudge and accidentally erase or smear or add to what was there. I think sometimes the technology stuff is a poor version of the real deal. The idea process seems to need a physical touch. The contact of fingers to board to chalk connects back to the brain in unique way. I think as tablets evolve this might improve, but sometimes don't you just want to write with chalk? Maybe it was the whole high contrast (white against green or black) thing too? Nostalgia!! :)
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