by Xinming (Simon) Guo
Just one month after we discovered Weiqi (Chinese for Go) in the new exhibition at the Chinese American Museum of Chicago (Go featured in Chicago museum exhibit), we welcomed the first school field trip visitors: 30 students and chaperones from Cherokee Elementary School, who visited the museum and participated in our on-site go game workshop.
These elementary students first learned how to play Go for 45 minutes in the workshop area, and then moved to the the gallery areas to see the exhibitions. The students were very surprised and excited to discover that Go was played by Chinese workers on the Transcontinental Railroad in the mid-19th century. Depending on the schedule, a Go workshop can also be provided after the museum tour. For workshops like this, the same teaching method is used as the one we use to introduce go as a math manipulative in schools. Usually we play on size 6 or 7 mini go board in the math classrooms.
“This is a brand new combo tour service, which combines the regular tour and hands-on Chinese culture/art workshop,” said Ben Lau, the executive director of Chinese American Museum of Chicago. School group visitors, especially students from Chinese language classrooms from Chicago Metropolitan Area, now have the opportunity to reserve their field trip to the museum, and choose one Chinese culture and art related workshop. Besides Go, calligraphy, Chinese painting, paper cutting, origami and more are on the list. See more photos here.
Guo organized the Go workshop and is the founder of the Go and Math Academy.
