blackboard

American  

[blak-bawrd, -bohrd] / ˈblækˌbɔrd, -ˌboʊrd /

noun

1. a sheet of smooth, hard material, especially dark slate, used in schools, lecture rooms, etc., for writing or drawing on with chalk.

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blackboard British  

/ ˈblækˌbɔːd /

noun

1. a hard or rigid surface made of a smooth usually dark substance, used for writing or drawing on with chalk, esp in teaching

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Etymology

Origin of blackboard

First recorded in 1815–25; black + board

Example Sentences

They always at least stay around the proverbial blackboard, as Friedman calls it, in case a player’s market doesn’t develop as expected.

From Los Angeles Times

Looming behind the bluesman is a blackboard, on which a genealogy of the blues has been chalk-drawn in an orderly hand.

From The Wall Street Journal

He would walk into the classroom, take a piece of chalk out of his pocket, go straight to the blackboard, and begin.

From Literature

What I miss most is closing my eyes at night, then opening them and it’s morning, that total submersion, yesterday’s problems wiped away like algebraic equations on a junior-high blackboard.

From The Wall Street Journal

"How can you rehabilitate classrooms if you don't have cement? And above all, we need notebooks and books ... blackboards, the bare minimum," said Beigbeder.

From Barron's