Start a New Story
“Every story starts with the assumption there is some acceptable, canonical state of the world. What starts the story going is that the expectable, the…
Tag: pedagogy
Pedagogical approaches and their political implications
Opal School led professional development workshops in Vancouver, BC last week. They were rich opportunities to connect and develop new ideas with educators in a…
What is a Teacher-Researcher, Anyway?
The teacher is the chief learner in the classroom. Donald Graves (quoted in Nonfiction Matters) When I was in my first (and second,…
Intentions: Transformation
Dear Families, In this complicated and uncertain world, we believe school is where we learn to be human. And right now, more than ever, we…
Materials as Metaphors
My recent post, Say What You Mean, began as this post — but I got so tangled up in thinking about the relationship between knowledge…
Say What you Mean
We’ve been infected with this kind of pathological impatience that makes us want to have the knowledge but not do the work of claiming it.…
Setting Intentions for Our Year Together – Intermediate Team
Opal School has two intermediate classrooms, Opal 3 & 4, which include third-, fourth-, and fifth-graders. In many ways, the teachers from the two classrooms function as a…
A Sneak-Peek Into Our Intentions
The Beginning School Team sent this letter to parents before the first day of the 2016-2017 school year. We’d love to hear the reflections of Opal School…
Why we don’t do art in school (and why we should)
This post by Susan Harris MacKay first appeared on the Living in Dialogue blog. In these times, when the demolition of a place as historic…
Where do you get your professional development?
Magnolia Room (Grades 1-2) whole class doodle. “It’s like an idea seed…” The question comes up, at some point, during almost every study tour.…