Sharing Good Practice
CREATE THE CLASSROOM OF
YOUR DREAMS
By Alona Ballard
A
fter four years of teaching
kindergarten and sharing a
room with a partner teacher,
I was delighted to make the
transition into teaching Cycle 1 for the
2014-15 school year.
Before I made my first visit to the new
school, Ain Jaloot in Al Bahya, Abu
Dhabi, I didn’t know what to expect, but
what I found was delightful.
This new space immediately reminded
me of the infamous text, ‘Last Lecture’
by the late Randy Pausch (its subtitle
was ‘Achieving Your Childhood
Dreams’).
In it, the computer science professor
recalls the dreams he achieved
and how he did it. He also urges his
audience to enable others to achieve
their childhood dreams. One quote
from that lecture really stands out
for me. Pausch, who had painted
everything from a quadratic formula
to a submarine on his walls in his
childhood home said, “If your kids want
to paint their bedroom, as a favour to
me, let them do it.”
While walking the hallways for an initial
tour, I saw something that I had never
seen at my former school, or any other
school for that matter. Words, written
on a wall -- with a sharpie! At that
moment I knew I was in the right place.
“Is it okay if I paint on the walls in
my classroom?” I asked my Head
of Faculty kind of sheepishly. I knew
that an affirmative response would
mean something magical was about to
happen.
“Sure, no problem,” she said.
Now with the go-ahead, I headed to
Ace Hardware and bought cans of
paint in the primary colours as well
as black and white. I painted on the
walls a baqala, a McDonald’s, a bank
branch and an ATM. These are places
the students and/or their parents
encounter daily.
In the McDonald’s, we