Week 6: Assignment Bank

It has been a week of what if's for me.  What if we could just turn schools upside down?  What if the creative spaces for learning were truly creative, open and welcome.  What if our learning was open--to all kinds of possibilities.

And, I thought it would be fun to share a photo of one of the classrooms we developed over the past two years.  It is a classroom with multiple spaces for learning, collaborating and interaction.  This was designed so that students could have spaces to work independently.  They could also collaborate in a face to face environment.  They could collaborate with other students using web based communication tools and video conferencing software.

They have the opportunity to work with more knowledgeable others including teachers and mentors.
It's a great place--but it was missing one element.  So, I put Toby under our tree.

I used a web-based photo editing program and a transparent photo overlay.  It is a fairly simply but effective procedure which is very intuitive.  My photo editing skills are marginal--but I think this one turned out pretty well.

Re-conceptualizing learning spaces is difficult because we are all somewhat set in our ways when it comes to what schools look like.  Even most newer designs still begin with a series of rooms on either side of a series of hallways.  This is both inefficient and inadequate for creating collaborative created spaces for students.

I had fun with this--and created another aspect of change thinking.