tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-378096772024-03-13T23:53:37.969-07:00Take Your Learning With You Wherever You GoA blog describing my crooked pathway toward educational enlightenment through classroom design.
Overview of this site in Prezi: http://prezi.com/aojirtdlkazv/classroom-design/
Twitter: @gooomanjiGooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.comBlogger164125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-44914904118012900722024-02-03T20:09:00.000-08:002024-02-03T20:09:23.590-08:00The New Building, Finally.You might remember that last year I moved to a new school after swearing I'd never move to another new school. You may remember that we were housed in a different school last year while we waited for this school to be finished. You may remember that my wife broke her hip earlier that August. The week before we opened in our new building, we unpacked and moved in. Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-60360179063254995382023-10-02T10:39:00.004-07:002023-10-02T15:14:29.178-07:00The TripWe LOVE(d) Montreal. The food, the culture, the language, the history, etc. Sure, we were snowed in at the airport once for 7 hours. Sure, we almost got diverted due to a freak rainstorm another time, but it is Montreal. And when my wife and I decided to take a romantic get away, we knew where we wanted to go. It was the summer. What could go wrong?We Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-36217959365212064022023-01-21T13:42:00.001-08:002023-01-21T13:42:32.809-08:00Dude, where is your school?This post is a follow-up to my last one which was about moving to a new school. So many questions following that post.It is now late January, and you might be wondering why I didn't post about what the new school is like. Well.........Technically, I moved into a new school in September. Technically, my new school opened with a small, but talented staff (6 divisions). Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-51571921183143833432022-06-25T07:17:00.004-07:002022-06-25T07:18:17.244-07:00Moving....again?!I'm moving. Again.It's a new school. Again.Remember how I said I wouldn't move, and definitely not to a new build? Yeah, no.So how did it happen? It was a series of small chips.I ran into my friend, Leanne, while I was shopping for a Mother's Day gift. We had a nice visit in the middle of the summer dress aisle. She said, "I was just talking about you today at Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-13704907611061869262022-03-22T13:50:00.000-07:002022-03-22T13:50:28.671-07:00 Quick and Dirty Oral Language Strategies How about something I can use tomorrow in my class, Greg?Deb Vanderwood asked me to submit some oral language strategies for a literacy newsletter she was doing for the district. I'll post them here in case you, dear reader, need a break from my recent self-indulgent thread of woodworking articles. Here are snapshots of low-prep, high-yield speaking, listening, and thinking strategies and Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-9556978381041528332022-03-06T11:38:00.000-08:002022-03-06T11:38:12.678-08:0099% Invisible - My favourite (design) podcast As you know, I love listening to audiobooks. I "read" non-fiction during the day to stimulate my brain as I do the dishes, and I like a good story to help me unclench my brain so I can go to sleep. Since COVID though, I find myself listening to podcasts more and more. My favourite right now is Roman Mars' 99% Invisible.99% Invisible talks about the untold design stories Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-5072236321868756482022-02-27T20:52:00.000-08:002022-02-27T20:52:56.334-08:00Curves! The Rocker Stool So much of the architecture in my classroom (and every class I've had) is the domination of boxes, rectangles, and straight lines. In our math class, we don't just learn the names of shapes, but we also talk about the impact of shapes. Though rectangles give order and alignment, they also promote uniformity and a feeling of being boxed in. The desks and tables are Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-27505841648983341462022-01-30T20:17:00.000-08:002022-01-30T20:17:17.872-08:00New Toys: Woodworking Tools for Teachers/Classroom DesignersI was watching the Great British Sewing Bee on TV, and I realized that sewing is a lot like woodwork: you cut bigger bits into smaller bits and then you stick the bits back together again into a finished shape. In a previous post (here), I talked about how to get started building your own projects for your classroom. Sometimes you need particular tools to accomplish each task properly. Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-61298386587945553982022-01-23T21:40:00.000-08:002022-01-23T21:40:59.199-08:00Impact: Does Classroom Design Help Teaching in a COVID World?The Context In September of 2020, I wrote about how I set up my classroom going in to teaching in a COVID context (here). Since then, I've had the chance to think about the role classroom design has on teaching in a COVID context. To recap, in September of 2020: Students were distanced as much as possible, and at that time, there was no mask mandate for Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-36009156761067537642021-05-30T19:11:00.000-07:002021-05-30T19:11:10.278-07:00Creating Culture in a New SchoolOne of the workshops that I am the most proud of was the one I did the first year at Smiling Creek. Because I was really wrapped up in my work with Landscapes of Injustice, I had not done much to contribute to my new school, and in the first year of any school, everyone should pitch in something. We had so many strong teachers that I was not so sure what I had to offer. For the Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-22205507474326635682021-05-02T12:54:00.000-07:002021-05-02T12:54:28.829-07:00Woodprojects in the Classroom 4: Student Design Challenge: T's New Workspace Following the success of the 3 Pieces of Wood project, a new project emerged naturally. As the year progressed, it became clear that one of my students, T, needed to change where her workspace was. She was in and out of the classroom for sensory breaks and because her workspace was far from the classroom door, she would get distracted and not make it all the way there. Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-54639711706656274912021-04-25T12:51:00.000-07:002021-04-25T12:51:23.897-07:00Wood Projects in the Classroom 3: Student Designs* Kids love to build. I have Keva, Kinex, Lego, and Tinkertoy in my classroom, but the most popular building material in my class was this big bag of off cuts I had that were leftovers from my garage wood shop. These off cuts were so, so popular. And they had to go.Like any great (and failed) relationship, it started off slowly. No one noticed the lumpy bag in theGooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-88172237827510089532021-04-18T09:38:00.000-07:002021-04-18T09:38:12.722-07:00Wood Projects in the Classroom 2: Teacher DIYUnskilled labourMy worst subjects in junior high school were Woodwork, Music, and Social Studies. If you know me, this is deeply, deeply ironic when you think of me now. To explain, because of getting involved with Japanese Canadian history, I am known for my work in Social Studies, but my early teen self was pretty clueless and apathetic about Social Studies. Though my teen Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-14533108409087457092021-04-02T20:48:00.001-07:002022-01-23T12:23:56.182-08:00Wood Projects in the Classroom 1: Students' Storage during COVIDThe Problem: Individual StorageOne of the many problems I had with COVID was storage. Because we didn't know what was going to transfer the virus, I had students keep a minimum of supplies with them, but because some students were in desks and some were at tables, this meant that each student had to have individual, self-contained storage. At first, this was not a problem becauseGooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-28817277652255413842021-03-23T17:01:00.004-07:002021-03-25T20:56:45.919-07:00The VoiceThis post came to me after a conversation with SEL guru Miriam Miller.What is my number 1 tool for SEL?If I told you the one thing that helps me set the my classroom the environment the most, you might be surprised. No, it's not my risers (though they would be what you might notice first when visiting my pre-COVID classroom). No, it's not the muted lighting. No, it not the Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-8630093029748388622020-11-08T14:22:00.001-08:002020-11-08T14:22:48.719-08:00The Photoshoot
A while back, I attended a reunion for Governor General history teaching award winners in Ottawa. They asked if anyone wanted to be interviewed about anything new they were working on. I volunteered and talked about this new project I am part of called Landscapes of Injustice. The project is a massive 7 year multidisciplinary research project through UVic that is investigating Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-48290791245945814892020-11-01T17:49:00.004-08:002020-11-01T21:33:29.694-08:00"Counter" Intuitive: Design and Coffee MakersHey Teacher Friends, I don't know about you, but one thing that is helping me with getting through the teaching in this unusual COVID context is coffee. If you know me, you probably know that I have to be really careful about how much caffeine I ingest. Too much or too late, and I don't sleep. (I still keep chocolate and tea to a minimum, and I haven't had a cola in years.) The Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-73345292489574206172020-09-01T16:45:00.001-07:002022-01-23T10:17:57.303-08:00"Is Classroom Design (Still) a Thing?" Classrooms in a COVID context.It's hard to believe, but I started my Classroom Design journey 10 years ago. From the beginning of my teaching career, from my first portable 30 years ago, I always thought about the way classrooms affect learning. It wasn't until I started this blog though that I actually began to act on this idea. I started blogging here for a few reasons: 1. I wanted to Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-55387386578689469132020-03-23T20:06:00.001-07:002020-03-23T20:09:48.694-07:00The PurgePrologue
This is a blog post that I wrote last year, 2019, and then for some reason forgot to post it.
The Challenge
My friend Lori challenged me during the Christmas break with this idea she got from some minimalist organization. The idea was to get rid of one thing on the first day of January, two things on the second, three things on the third, and so on until on the 30th day you are Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-7782794096570209362019-11-11T21:02:00.002-08:002019-11-11T21:02:31.500-08:00"New" School: Smiling Creek ElementaryHi Classroom Design Friends,
Last year I moved schools from a 50 year old (but my room looked Dickensian; no direct sunlight, grates on the windows, mice) school, Leigh Elementary, to a factory fresh school with the cheerfully natural name of "Smiling Creek". I tend to move every 4-6 years to keep my teaching fresh, to learn new things, and have an excuse for not knowing what is going on.&Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-84413188284633344892018-03-05T20:28:00.001-08:002018-03-05T20:28:39.231-08:00Where was I? Oh yeah...As I was saying....
Last year, I wrote about monotasking, and how to put all of your eggs in one basket by focusing on the basket (i.e. what is the thing that brings all of your tasks together into one meaningful bundle?). And then I ended up in Emergency because I couldn't feel my feet, so I don't know if that strategy really worked for me. Or maybe the strategy works, but I wasn't Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-40565556963680833392017-09-10T20:19:00.000-07:002017-09-10T20:19:25.020-07:003 Books about Innovation, the Power of Simplicity.I read some books about innovation, and they all say the same thing: simplicity, simplicity, simplicity.
1. One of them is Ed Catmull's Creativity, Inc. One of my respected colleagues, Cheryl Lloyd, sent me an email with the subject line, "My book choice for you to read, Greg!" The email had no text in the body of it, just an attached photo of the cover. I was intrigued Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-85441766994077730262017-08-24T12:38:00.001-07:002017-08-24T12:38:16.211-07:00Cruising and Personal SpaceThis is a follow up to my last post about introversion and classroom design.
Last week, I got back from a trip to Europe. My generous mom took me, my wife, my daughter, my sister and her two girls to the Mediterranean. Last year, my mom, expressed a desire to take us all on a family trip somewhere to create some family memories, but with the potential of being positive family Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-22077335814867128852017-07-30T19:58:00.001-07:002017-07-30T21:01:34.505-07:00The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo, Inclusion, and MeI just got back from the Sunshine Coast with my family. We stay in this great trailer a few paces back from my wife's parents' summer home that looks out on the water. It is a pretty, glorious spot and we go there every year to frolic on the beach. I always load up with audio books on my player so I can listen to stories and books while I am up there.
This time, one of Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37809677.post-45952888920944007022017-06-22T22:39:00.001-07:002017-06-22T22:39:29.811-07:00Foreign Relations?This week I was invited to a dinner meeting with the Consul General of Japan, here in Vancouver. I'd met her once before when she gave some words of greeting at a book signing, but I never thought I would be having a sit down meeting with her. It was a nice time at her residence off Granville. My friend, Mike Perry-Whittingham (also co-chair of the Education Cluster with me for Gooomanjihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11748674873725555030noreply@blogger.com0