Having spent the first ten years of my career as a teacher stationed within the four walls of a solitary classroom, I often felt the itch to change the scene. The classroom felt like a box, and I wanted the ability to think, teach, and learn outside of it. Looking back, I ask myself what about the classroom made me yearn for something different: Was it the industrial lighting? Was it the openness that caused poor acoustics? Was it the set of desks crammed into the room, limiting movement and restricting certain pedagogies? Or was it just the feeling of a known institutional setting that triggered a sense of hierarchy and group dynamics that I wanted to disrupt? Whatever it was, I became aware that the limitations of a classroom could never truly adapt to the real-time needs of each individual. Furthermore, the wellness goals we are finally beginning to prioritize as a society face major obstacles within a classroom. When kids have no place to go when they feel X (insert your own emotion here), they can feel trapped inside the box that is a classroom.

Aggravating the classroom problem is the space immediately adjacent. For the schools I taught in, and the majority of schools I’ve been in, the hallway is not designed to be a learning space – I’ll refer to these as non-learning hallways. In my experience, non-learning hallways serve two main purposes: (1) circulation paths and (2) a place to store students’ personal items (i.e. house lockers). This may sound benign, but if the byproduct of this design approach is isolated classrooms that inhibit wellness, personalization, and certain pedagogies, it’s a problem that needs to be addressed.

It wasn’t until I started working with Randy Fielding and was introduced to a different spatial paradigm that I understood the full consequences of non-learning hallways. One of my biggest ah-ha moments came when I learned that hallways can make up nearly 30% of a school’s overall area. So not only are non-learning hallways contributing to isolated classrooms, but they are also creating vast stretches of grossly underutilized floor area within the school. Recouping this area is a huge opportunity, financially and educationally.

Since the revelation of non-learning hallways, I’ve had a chance to talk to countless teachers and students who share similar frustrations.  “If we just had a decent small group breakout space” and “if I could just have a calm place to relax and feel alone” are common desires I hear. Fortunately, there’s a Design Pattern called Active Hallway that aims to address the problem. If it’s not possible to make the full transition to a Learning Community model, which essentially gets rid of conventional hallways, activating your hallways is the next best thing.

What does it mean to activate a hallway

Activating a hallway means making physical changes so that corridors are able to be learning spaces. When this is paired with an educator mindset shift about where learning happens, the results are powerful. The physical changes can be accomplished in a number of ways, and each school has its own conditions to consider; with that understanding, we’ve seen trends towards fewer and/or smaller student lockers across the globe that can support hallway activation. By eliminating some locker banks and/or replacing full-height lockers with half-height ones, a considerable amount of space is opened for furniture to accommodate individual students and small groups.

Consider this image of a junior high hallway:

From the image above, a plan to replace the full height lockers with half-height ones opened up enough space for small zones with agile furniture. With this fairly minor change, the hallway was able to be redesigned as a learning space, as you can begin to imagine from the plans below.

Be Creative As You Activate Your Hallways

To be clear, there’s no one right way to activate a hallway, but creating seating options and workstations is always a good way to incentivize usage. At the same time, considering how the walls are used can serve to spark creativity and interaction. Through the use of writable surfaces and learning walls, like you can see in the two images below, hallways can become places of collaboration, curiosity, and play.

Final Word

If you are a teacher, a school leader, or a student, and you want to break free of the spatial limitations of a classroom, activating your hallways can be a good first step. It can spark a culture shift towards more collaborative practices, give students more agency over the way they use time and space, and shape an environment that is more adaptable to the real-time needs of the people who use it. And best of all, you can do that with minimal construction or sacrificing any existing space. It’s an inexpensive option that can profoundly impact teaching and learning, so what are you waiting for?

Senior Designer at Fielding International, Cierra Mantz is a registered architect with a Masters in Educational Leadership and Societal Change. Through her work, she seeks to champion change within education through innovative design, research, and grassroots community engagement.

Senior Learning Designer at Fielding International and USA Country Lead at HundrED, Nathan Strenge approaches school design with an innovative educator lens. As a teacher of ten years, Nathan’s drive to transform education comes from his belief that all people deserve to learn in an environment that adapts to their unique gifts and needs. Follow Nathan on Twitter at @nathanstrenge. 

The post Activate Your Hallways! appeared first on Getting Smart.

Problem: Most common areas are designed as secondary spaces, a place for breaking out from the classroom. But as schools transform from a traditional, classroom-based approach to a learner-centered approach, common areas become essential hubs of learning; and as such, require carefully orchestrated design.

In recent years, a learner-centered model of education has become increasingly popular.  As a result, we at Fielding International see an emerging trend in the vision statements of many schools: there is an emphasis on multiple pathways toward excellence and achievement for all students. These statements often go on to call out specific student characteristics and skills such as holistic well-being, critical thinking, creative problem solving, technological and media literacy, communication, and collaboration. At the same time, most educators have begun to acknowledge that the physical learning environment is a key factor in supporting their educational vision – the environment can catalyze, or hinder, desired competencies.

One type of space that comes up again and again as having the potential to disrupt the isolated nature of the classroom model and align with the goals schools have today is the Learning Commons.  A well-designed Learning Commons supports each of the competencies schools are trying to foster in their students; thus, it is an essential resource for any school seeking to achieve learner-centered visions.  Despite people wanting access to Commons, they are often poorly designed and underutilized. So why do people want them in the first place?

A well-designed Learning Commons is foundational for creating fluidly connected spaces that foster collaborative, interdisciplinary, and self-directed learning. A well-designed Commons features spatial diversity which makes it possible to simultaneously facilitate learning experiences that incorporate a range of learning modalities.  Spatial fluidity plus spatial diversity equals a kind of spatial agility that responds to the real-time needs of kids and adults alike, making them ideal places to cultivate dynamic communities built on relationships, belonging, and agency. So, if Learning Commons are so beneficial, and people actively want them, what can history tell us about why they are frequently ineffective?

As early as the open classroom moment of the 1970s and later in the middle school pod movement of the 1980s, the idea of communal learning areas was explored. Ultimately, these explorations failed for numerous reasons, many of which were spatial, including a lack of spatial diversity and limited connections to the outdoors (just to name a couple); but some of the reasons can also be attributed to a lack of professional resources and educational programming in support of the model.

In the decades since architects and educators first attempted to disrupt the notion that the classroom should be the primary place for learning, we’ve made significant progress regarding how we can design the physical environment to be an educational asset in the learning process.  This article will focus on the spatial design components necessary for a well-designed Learning Commons.  Specifically, we’ll discuss six key elements for thriving Learning Commons:

1. Strong indoor-outdoor connections
2. Visual and permeable connections to adjacent spaces
3. Diverse activity zones
4. Varied furnishings, fixtures, and finishes
5. Sound attenuation
6. Access to water and storage

Strong Indoor-Outdoor Connections

We can see many elements that support thriving in the Design Pattern sketch above. Foremost, a connection to the outside that offers natural light and views is important for nurturing a sense of wellness. In The Extended Mind, Annie Murphy Paul cites research that indicates students’ ability to look outside improves academic outcomes. Despite the awareness of humans’ innate desire to be connected with nature, and research showing its multilayered benefits, we see many flawed common areas which are surrounded by classrooms–essentially, widened corridors–without a connection to the outside. If the surrounding classrooms have natural light and the Learning Commons doesn’t, where will learners want to be?

An indoor-outdoor connection can also be reinforced through the use of natural building materials and finishes. In the photo of Schiffer Collaborative School below, we can see how the use of local stone, wood, and natural light contributes to an atmosphere of beauty and calm, mirroring the local landscape.

Visual & Permeable Connections to Adjacent Spaces

Strong visual connections and permeable boundaries between spaces invite students to walk, observe and engage with their peers and their environments inside and out. Interior windows, glass doors, and movable walls offer learners the opportunity to move outside their classrooms into adjacent project labs, learning studios, outdoor classrooms, and cave spaces where they can work individually and/or in groups while still receiving the benefit of visual supervision by teachers–an important element of safety.  In addition to visually connected safety, students have the opportunity to connect with four to six teachers and around 100-120 students, versus one teacher and 20-30 students in a conventional classroom. As such, well-designed Learning Commons increases the odds that a learner will develop a close connection with an adult and peers, enhancing their sense of belonging.

In the image below, from Saint Francis of Assisi Elementary, we can see how permeable boundaries and visual connections facilitate student autonomy and collaboration among students and between students and teachers.

Diverse Activity Zones

Learning is a complex process that happens in many ways; therefore, it’s critical that the types of available spaces are designed to support multiple learning modalities as well as all aspects of the learning process. In order to design for this, spatial diversity is crucial.  In the Design Pattern sketch at the beginning of the article, we see three activity zones: small group and individual, project zone, and presentation.  While these three zones are not exhaustive of the types of zones a Learning Commons may have, they provide a framework for understanding how multiple zones can be created in a single open space.  In addition to more broadly defined activity zones, for times in which a learner needs a quieter, personalized space, we provide cave spaces, calming retreats, and smaller tables or booths for independent work and reflection. These areas allow students to have personal space while still being visually connected to others.

In the image below, from South Clearfield Elementary, we can see how cave spaces provide a sense of partial enclosure–a space to feel secure, read quietly, and look out with curiosity and wonder.

Varied Furnishings, Fixtures, and Finishes

Each activity zone has very distinct spatial features and qualities.  As such, the interior design elements, including furniture, fixtures, equipment, and finishes become exceedingly important.  For furniture, this means having a variety of seating arrangements and types, including a range of soft and hard seating options as well as tables of varying sizes and heights.  Important fixtures and equipment to consider include, most importantly, lighting, but also audio-visual equipment and technology-enhanced furnishings for presentations and collaboration.  Last, but certainly not least, finishes provide a crucial differentiator.  From acoustic treatments to floor and wall finishes, the look, feel, and overall atmosphere of a space is defined by the finishes.  For this reason, it is critically important that the finishes are intentionally selected with the activity zones in mind.

In the image below of Norma Rose Point Elementary, we see that the areas in front of the sink and within the learning studios have easily cleanable flooring that make this zone ideal for wet and messy projects.

Sound Attenuation

One spatial characteristic that can make or break a Learning Commons is the acoustic design.  Because a Learning Commons is an open, multi-zoned space, dampening the transmission of sound is critical.  And yet, we often find this to be one of the most overlooked design elements.  During a recent discovery visit, the importance of sound attenuation was reinforced over and over again. In advance of our arrival, school board leadership had toured an FI-designed school, Saint Francis of Assisi, and they were blown away by how tranquil the learning environments felt.  In regards to the learning commons, they noted how easy it was to have a conversation on one side of the commons at the same time that a group of students was working in another part of the commons, while simultaneously an entire class had the garage door to a learning studio open and was moving in and out of the space as they transitioned from activity to activity.

All of the activity within the commons was able to co-exist because the sounds from each activity did not reverberate throughout the space; the sound was attenuated through the design and material selection for the ceilings, walls, and floors.  In contrast, when we toured the newest school in their district, everywhere we went there was a cacophony of noise–even the spaces that were designed to be calming breakout spaces.  As a result, many staff members were reticent to recommend open commons areas in future schools within the district.  However, since the leadership group had experienced what a well-designed commons can feel like, they became the biggest advocates again and again countering any claims of how distracting open commons areas are with how effective and beneficial they can be when sound is well addressed in the design.

Access to Water and Storage

As noted earlier, for learning that is best achieved when students get out of their chairs and engage in hands-on activities, we provide Project Zones.  These are areas that have easily cleanable flooring, a sink, and storage. For earlier grades, the project zone may serve as a place for wet and messy play. Whereas for older students, the same area can be designed as a place for small projects or a small kitchen, a universal feature that builds community and belonging

In the image below of Sinarmas World Academy, students are mastering Sumi-e, a type of Chinese ink wash painting, in the Commons.

Conclusion

When a learning commons is designed with an emphasis on strong indoor-outdoor connections; visual and permeable connections to adjacent spaces; diverse activity zones; varied furnishings, fixtures, and finishes; and good sound attenuation, it naturally becomes the thriving heart of the learning community.  As the thriving heart, the learning commons becomes a place that fosters a sense of love, support, and belonging, making learners truly feel at ease and at home in their school.  And, when students feel loved, supported, and included, it’s possible to imagine the cascading catalytic effects this can have on learning, creativity, mental health, social-emotional growth, and so much more!  So…despite a rocky history, don’t give up on the promise of vibrant Learning Commons. When you go into a school where they are well designed and teachers know how to use them, it is magical.

The post How to Design a Learning Commons appeared first on Getting Smart.

Imagine a typical day in the life of a student. What issues come to mind most connected to student anxiety? You may have thought about: bullying, tests, homework, relationship conflicts, food insecurities, physical appearance, and on-and-on. One thing you may not have thought of…going to the bathroom. However, if stressors were ranked according to students’ day-to-day lived experiences, it would be toward the top of the list.

Most schools have ‘gang style’ restrooms in which multiple toilets and/or urinals are enclosed using partial-height stall partitions that only provide a modicum of visual privacy and no acoustical separation. With this as the setting, now imagine all of the anxiety-inducing experiences one might have: digestive issues, embarrassing noises, no privacy for getting out big emotions or crying, using menstrual products that crinkle and are noisy when you open them, student-on-student abuse behind the closed doors of a ‘student-only’ space. Layer on top of this the experiences of students whose gender identity doesn’t fit neatly into the gender binary that this bathroom design presupposes and the situation is exacerbated ten-fold. At that point, anxiety about using the restroom can become unbearable.

As school designers, this is one of the most consistent problems we see. In fact, during a recent discovery visit to an elementary school in Rhode Island, we asked students to draw their dream school and, astonishingly, nearly 40% of the 4th and 5th-grade students’ drawings included bathrooms. Even more disheartening, two students used their whole drawing as an opportunity to redesign the bathrooms. If students feel the need to devote this much attention to addressing the design of their school’s bathrooms, it’s clearly a major problem. Unprompted, both parents and teachers also brought up the fact that the current restroom facilities were a major point of concern, noting that students need bathrooms that provide a sense of safety, where they could be ensured privacy and a place to let out their emotions and self-regulate.

So, what’s the solution? In an effort to make every person in a school feel safe & welcome, restrooms can be organized and arranged to inclusively accommodate the full spectrum of gender expressions, physical abilities, and privacy needs. By creating fully enclosed toilet rooms with floor-to-ceiling walls, each toilet room has authentic privacy, making it unnecessary to segregate students at all. Each toilet room is non-gendered and open to all.  Some toilet rooms are larger to accommodate students with differing physical needs, and a communal sink is open and fully accessible at all times. By opening up the sink area, adults can passively supervise this space to further ensure student safety. More importantly, deemphasizing a gender binary, can instill person-first values that highlight our underline humanity before applying any culturally ascribed identity markers. In this model, instead of bathrooms becoming contentions spaces that divide us, they can become spaces that give us the necessary individual privacy that we all crave, while at the same time, bringing us together around a proverbial watering hole.

Yet, there’s no single model for achieving inclusive bathrooms. Another design solution is what we like to call, ‘home-like’ bathrooms. In this model, each toilet room also contains a sink and mirror so the entire bathroom experience more closely resembles the conditions you might experience at home. This provides an added layer of privacy that may make the bathroom experience even more inclusive. For example, students of various faith backgrounds may want to perform their ablutions behind closed doors so as not to draw attention to themselves.  Similarly, for girls and women whose religious beliefs encourage wearing veils or headscarves, it’s important to have a private place with a mirror to occasionally take it off and adjust it during the day.  Students who are accustomed to using bidets may need direct access to water to fill hand-held cleansing devices–not something your average student wants to fill up in a communal sink before going into the toilet. And, what about the use of menstrual cups and colostomy bags that need to be emptied and rinsed periodically? For schools that identify the above as issues to address, it may be important to incorporate some home-like bathrooms into each learning community.

School is meant to be a place for learning. However, if students feel unsafe and unwelcome then their basic human needs are not being met, making it impossible for high-level thinking to occur. Being preoccupied with whether you’re going to be bullied in the bathroom, chastised for crying, or embarrassed by your next bowel movement are not concerns students need to have.  A simple design solution makes these concerns obsolete. By designing inclusive and homelike bathrooms, we can eliminate one of the many items on students’ list of anxieties. Addressing the others?

At schoolpatterns.com you’ll find many patterns that address school-related anxiety, notably: Learning Community, Choice in Environment, Calming Retreat, Sensory Control, and more!

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In many people’s minds, the alternative to a classroom model for schools is a completely open concept, which was popular in the 1970s. The open concept is a prime example of the cure being worse than the disease. In an open concept, noise and distraction exasperate poor conditions for learning and individual wellness. Both the classroom model and the open concept fail to recognize that it isn’t a single type of space we need, but a diversity of accessible spaces.  A growing understanding of how the human brain informs us that during any given day, each person’s needs (while unique and varied) will require time to learn collaboratively, time to themselves, and time to be active.

The key to unlocking environments where all learners thrive is creating a diverse array of accessible spaces that allow each person’s unique and real-time needs to be met. An interconnected suite of spaces, including Learning Studios, Learning Suites, and Learning Commons answer this need. We refer to this suite of diverse spaces as a Learning Community.

What do we mean by a Learning Studio? It’s an updated classroom–a word that carries an association as a rectangular space with four walls and a door, with student desks aligned in rows facing a teaching wall. To break the classroom mindset of the past, we’ve renamed the “classroom” as a “Learning Studio,” an agile space with multiple zones that foster a wide spectrum of learning activities.

In the shift from a conventional classroom model to a dynamically interconnected suite of spaces, connecting two classrooms is often the simplest first step to disrupt isolation. It’s a buddy system, where two teachers can support each other and interweave their curriculums together while maintaining the ability to operate as two independent environments. This works well with multi-age groupings, same department groupings, such as two math or English classes, and affinity groupings, such as humanities or STEM pairings.

An accessible Learning Commons with strong visual transparency into Learning Suite/Studios is a way to bring this to the next level. In the transformation from a classroom model, the Learning Commons can serve as an important place for small groups breakouts, one-on-one mentoring, and calming retreats for quiet and reflection. (Pro tip: make sure Learning Commons gets ample natural light, or they won’t be a desirable place to go).

To fully utilize this suite of diverse spaces, teachers need professional development and specific programs that embed multiple disciplines.  Instead of classrooms, let’s create Learning Studios, Learning Suites, and Learning Commons that foster authentic, relevant, and interdisciplinary learning. And let’s work together to create educational programs that break down the walls of isolation to put difference-making at the heart of learning.

Related Pattern: Learning Community- Working with Cells and Bell

The post Learning Suites: A First Step in Overcoming Isolation in Schools appeared first on Getting Smart.

About a decade ago, I had the opportunity to teach Upward Bound high school students math through a summer program at St. Olaf College. The classroom I was stationed at was down the hall from the President’s Office; it had been recently built and was surprisingly simple. Simple seats, simple tables, and a simple tech podium that communicated with a simple mounted projector. The most extraordinary thing about the space was that all four of the walls were floor-to-ceiling writable surfaces.

It’s hard to convey how big of an impact the writable walls had on learning and class dynamics. I could project a challenging Algebraic modeling prompt, an image requiring spatial reasoning, a complex logic puzzle, really whatever sparked deeper thinking and problem solving, and then send the kids to go “work it out” on the walls. Sometimes they would work alone and sometimes in pairs or small groups; it was powerful to see how the writable walls became an element that fostered critical thinking, collaboration, and communication.

It was commonplace for someone to get stuck in the middle of working something out – I would observe them as they would think independently for a while, and if they couldn’t quite crack it, begin to saunter around the room seeing how others were handling the situation. Kids would organically start asking each other questions and sharing how they were approaching the problem, troubleshooting different methods, and finding solutions that worked (or in many cases, solutions that didn’t work). We would do activities where kids needed to describe their problem-solving approach in words on the walls and then rotate to read others and give feedback both on the mathematical reasoning as well as how the other communicated their reasoning.

We overtly welcomed mistakes as part of the learning process, and when kids could see each other’s mistakes visually on the walls, it began to break down some of the fear I’ve heard many kids express about not wanting to be wrong and therefore not challenging themselves. In a very short time, the writable surfaces helped cultivate a culture of growth mindfulness, even overcoming the negative feelings many of the kids had towards math and sometimes school in general. In addition to the deep learning that I was seeing happening before my eyes, at the end of the summer, more than one of the students thanked me for how much they got to get up out of their chairs and move around in my class. Others told me that in the past they hated going to math because it made them feel stupid and alone, and now they had a different belief in themselves.

The floor-to-ceiling writable surfaces weren’t the only reason those kids experienced success that summer, but they sure did provide an enriching environment for the kind of deeper learner, relationship-centered experiences that I strived to provide as a teacher.

Today, in my role as a Senior Learning Designer at Fielding International, I am encouraged when I share the writable surfaces design pattern with kids and teachers around the world, and the universal response is, “yes, we need that!” You’ll see in the pictures below how they can work in different spatial contexts, and you can begin to imagine ways to bring writable surfaces to your school. If you’d like to check out the writing surfaces pattern in detail, you can find it here.

Nathan Strenge is a Senior Learning Designer at Fielding International, where he works with school communities around the world to create environments that foster creativity, collaboration, wellness, and belonging. Nathan serves as the USA Country Lead for Finnish nonprofit HundrED, a globally-recognized leader in education innovation. Nathan is also a co-founder of Exploration High School, a public school for public good, that opened in 2021 in Minneapolis. He can be reached at nathan.strenge@fieldingintl.com.

The post The Multilayered Benefits of Writable Surfaces appeared first on Getting Smart.

The disparity is particularly evident between primary and secondary students. When we talk to younger students, they often say that they are looking forward to having lockers – a bit of personal space that they can control. However, the use of lockers by middle and high school students has been declining for decades. Most schools are simply providing fewer lockers, but they are missing an opportunity to provide lockers that actually build relationships and increase well-being.

In the image of the International School of Brussels above, the free-standing bank of lockable cubbies on the left is an informal island for connection. Learners moving through the space can pause, lean their elbows on the counter and chat with their peers, or use it as a temporary standing desk. The bank of cubbies on the right anchors the collaborative work table in the foreground; it also has coat hooks on the end, for jackets, removing the necessity for full height lockers, which can dominate a space.

We can see a number of elements that nurture relationships and personal well-being in the image of Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Minneapolis, above. Small groupings of partial height lockers provide enough storage for personal items, with a shelf, rod, and hooks adjacent for backpacks and coats. Rather than long banks of lockers in hallways, the smaller grouping invites learners to connect with each other.

We don’t need to eliminate student storage in schools because rows of full-height lockers aren’t being used well. Instead, let’s provide a variety of storage elements that build relationships and enhance individual well-being. A varied and personalized approach to student storage has the additional benefit of allowing for more wall surfaces, freeing up space for writable surfaces, student displays, and increased transparency using interior windows.

A strategy for distributed storage elements of varying types uses less space, is less expensive, and can even support school buildings with a slightly smaller footprint, making our planet more sustainable.

The post Personalized Storage in Schools appeared first on Getting Smart.

For teachers that were trained to direct learning and maintain order, the need to control students’ attention is a natural one, but in a learner-centered world, it’s highly limiting and even unhealthy. As the young woman boldly stated, not being able to look outside can be downright suffocating. While we all understand the essential need for oxygen, the need to periodically change one’s focal length for eye health and well-being is less well-known but no less important.

Research has shown that the eye is most relaxed when viewing distant images. As described in the  Physics of the Eye, “Since light rays from a nearby object can diverge and still enter the eye, the lens must be more converging (more powerful) for close vision than for distant vision. To be more converging, the lens is made thicker by the action of the ciliary muscle surrounding it. The eye is most relaxed when viewing distant objects…vision of very distant objects is called totally relaxed, while close vision is termed accommodated…”

As a result, it is natural to look up and out frequently. You can observe this yourself in a classroom, office, or public space. Individuals frequently look up from a book or computer screen and focus on a more distant image–a view of the landscape, the city, or even an interior vista to a distant focal point. Unconsciously, we change our focal length to rest our eyes.

As designers, we can leverage the instinct to look up and out and link it to another essential element of well-being—movement. Instinctively, we tend to move towards light and color (unless we are frightened and in a flight state). Thus, vistas can be designed to define and order movement by first leading the eye, and then the body, through space.

While this sort of movement can be a stimulus to learning, paths that are confusing or counter-intuitive don’t make us feel secure enough to learn at our best. Therefore, designers can use movement as a positive design generator by choreographing scenarios in advance.

Imagine that you are entering a campus or school building. What do you see? Where is your eye drawn to? If a visual element in the distance is highlighted, a person will be attracted to move toward it. Imagine that a visual destination element is a sculptural form that is taller than the elements around it. As you near the element, your eye is then drawn to a wall with a brighter color and a higher level of illumination around the corner, leading you further into the building. Choreographed scenarios such as this help to create intuitive paths that both encourage movement and orient building users, thus providing them with a secure sense of place.

These same principles can be applied to the design of a new campus, a new building, or the interior of an existing space. In fact, even the simple act of opening the blinds can make a huge impact. Let there be light (and views)!

NOTE:  The same day that I toured the high school where the student said that closed blinds made the classroom feel suffocating, I learned that they immediately remedied the situation.  They opened the blinds and have kept them open since our visit. It’s a credit to the school’s culture that the student felt comfortable sharing her perspective, and the teacher was agile enough to respond.

The post School With a View: Vistas, Movement, and Learner Well-being appeared first on Getting Smart.

In our last Getting Smart article, we introduced six elements of thriving learners (pictured above). Using six school images, we examined how each thriving element is manifested in the physical environment, as well as its impact. Alone, each element adds tremendous value to learners’ experiences.  Combined, they provide the necessary preconditions for learners to thrive. However, when applied within the context of an overarching spatial paradigm that is designed to help foster each element, the benefit is exponential.

In this article, we will attempt to define a spatial paradigm that helps schools effectively create the conditions to foster the six thriving elements – we will call this the Thriving Paradigm. When defining something for the first time, it’s helpful to contrast it with something known. Thus, we will juxtapose the Thriving Paradigm with the spatial model that most readers of this publication experienced growing up, which we will call the Conventional Paradigm.

A Quick Note on Paradigms

Because we have chosen to use the term paradigm, we’d like to pause to reflect on the definition of this word and provide context for using it. Collins English Dictionary defines paradigm as: “a model for something that explains it or shows how it can be produced.”

There is nothing inherently good or bad about a paradigm. A paradigm typically arises to meet the needs of a specific set of circumstances. The conventional school spatial paradigm arose in the 20th-century to respond to a demand for bigger schools that could meet the needs of a growing student population. Two major events preceded this demand.  First, by 1918 all states had passed legislation requiring that all American children were required to attend at least Elementary School (source), making one room schoolhouses less practical. Secondly, post-WWII America witnessed booming populations and an increasing push for a baseline of literacy. As such, the conventional paradigm was a response that largely met the context of the time.

We, at Fielding International, want to be abundantly clear. We are not suggesting that it is impossible to have a great school that uses the conventional spatial paradigm. We know high-quality learning can happen inside conventional environments, and incredible educators around the world overcome spatial barriers every day. However, if we have different priorities for our schools in the 21st-century, and the environment can be designed to bring about those priorities, it is only natural that a different paradigm should arise.

With that, let’s explore the transformation from the Conventional Paradigm to the Thriving Paradigm.

From… The school building operates as a series of segregated, fixed learning spaces

To… The school building operates as a fluid environment of connected, agile learning spaces

In the Thriving Paradigm, learners are not stuck inside the walls of a set classroom environment. They experience diverse and adaptive spaces that support different kinds of learning goals, experiences, and accomplishments. Permeable, flexible spaces allow students to extend the reach of their learning beyond what a single, fixed classroom can offer. The kind of fluid, agile use of space that characterizes the Thriving Paradigm is not the same as what the Open School Movement of the 1970s came to mean. In that movement, openness, or lack of structure, often ended up being a kind of end in itself, as if taking away structure would cause learning to bloom. In the Thriving Paradigm, spaces are intentionally designed to match students’ varying learning needs, strengths, and interests and the school’s curricular goals. The physical environment is not simply unstructured; it is deliberately curated and cultivated to foster learners’ thriving. In the Thriving Paradigm, moreover, multiple and permeable spaces are carefully linked together, so learners don’t simply meander from one spot to the next but move with purpose and clear expectations.

From… A classroom-based approach to learning

To… A community-based approach to learning

Recognizing that young people are part of many nested communities (in and out of school), physical space can function to either isolate or catalyze relationships within these communities. As much as we can, we want to create structures that allow young people to build strong and meaningful relationships with teachers, peers, and outside-of-school community members. The Learning Community Design Pattern is a key pillar of the Thriving Paradigm as it allows both teachers and students to work and learn in relationship-centered environments. A community-based approach doesn’t limit learning to the walls of the school building but rather seeks ways to actualize anytime, anywhere learning.

From… Corridors function as arteries to get from one place to another

To… Corridors function as diverse learning spaces that foster connectivity and collaboration  

One of the biggest surprises I experienced when I started learning about school design – hallways can take up to 30% of the overall area of a school! To think that these spaces haven’t traditionally been seen as learning spaces… such a waste. In the Thriving Paradigm, corridors become dynamic places with excellent natural light, walkability, family-size groupings of small lockers, and embedded learning zones. In addition to contributing to a more connected and relationship-centered campus, this part of the paradigm shift dramatically increases the utilization rate, meaning buildings can be smaller and less expensive with a reduced carbon footprint.

From… School safety is mostly focused on building security

To… School safety takes a holistic approach that addresses building security and each student’s mental, physical, & social-emotional health

Schools can maintain physical building security through best practices like layered access, multiple egresses, and the ability to lockdown learning communities. But, school safety that doesn’t consider the holistic health and well-being of the individuals in the environment simply isn’t good enough for our students and teachers. With our deeper understanding of how trauma impacts learning, the ongoing reality of youth mental challenges, and teacher burnout, it’s never been more important to create holistically safe school environments for learners of all ages.

From… Outdoor spaces are primarily used for recess and sports

To… Outdoor spaces are seen as essential places to learn, connect with nature, and engage in physical activity

In discovery visits that we’ve done with young people all over the world, one of the two most common desires we hear is more outdoor learning (the other is more small, intimate spaces). Pairing this desire with the myriad of health, wellness, and educational benefits that result from connecting with nature, it’s a no-brainer for schools to shift mindsets and create spaces that get kids learning outdoors.

From… Institutional, static furniture & fixtures that tend to support lots of sitting and obedience

To… Comfortable, diverse, and agile furniture & fixtures that tends to support more movement and choice

The way we furnish our learning spaces says a lot about our priorities for how the space will be used. While rows of institutional desks where students sit for most of the day are no longer en vogue, many of today’s schools still lack the diversity of spaces and furnishings that support genuine student agency and social-emotional learning.

From… Good lighting and acoustics are seen as a luxury

To… Good lighting (especially natural light throughout the school) and acoustics are prioritized

Historically speaking, citadels didn’t have good natural lighting. There was a reason for this: it made the structure more defensible. Throughout the 20th-century, three-building types, unfortunately, continued the tradition of the inward orientation of these historical fortresses: shopping malls, prisons, and schools. Early in my work with Fielding International, I asked Randy Fielding what he believed to be the most important feature of a good design school. He surprised me by saying “good lighting.” The more I’ve walked through windowless hallways and classrooms with uniform fluorescent lamps, the more I get his point. And as any teacher who has been in noisy open environments can attest to, good acoustics are critically important.

From…The physical environment lacks a strong sense of local ethos, often isolated from the rest of the surrounding community

To… The physical environment embodies local values and context, often aiming to become more of a whole community asset

A school can feel like it’s an integrated part of the community it serves. The structure itself can blend with local elements, like Strathcona Tweedsmuir below using the angled roof peaks and organic material and patterns to feel part of the natural world around it. Schools can incorporate locally-sourced natural materials for both environmental and wellness benefits. Through space and programming, creative schools actively seek opportunities to become a vibrant community hub that welcomes a wide and diverse part of the community. In doing so, they bring in local connections and make learning for the young people they serve more authentic and relevant.

Bring the Thriving Paradigm Home

If you are someone who wants to move towards a spatial paradigm that aligns with your commitment to thriving kids, don’t hesitate to reach out. We’ve worked with school communities in over 50 countries with a wide range of available resources and readiness, and we are happy to provide guidance to identify the next steps that work best for you.

Author’s note: I want to thank Cierra Mantz and Glen Fielding for the incredible collaboration in editing and offering suggestions to bring the Thriving Paradigm alive.

Nathan Strenge is a Senior Learning Designer at Fielding International, USA Country Lead at HundrED, and Founding Board Chair of Exploration High School. He can be reached at nathan.strenge@fieldingintl.com or found on LinkedIn.

The post A Spatial Paradigm for Thriving Learners appeared first on Getting Smart.

One year ago from this publication, on January 6, 2021, people from around the world witnessed an American Insurrection. A confluence of factors led to this event, and it’s not the goal of this article to diagnose them. What is worthy of investigation is thinking about the role education can play to create conditions that counteract the forces that led to the Insurrection.

At Fielding International, we are known for designing schools that foster authentic collaboration, creativity, wellness, and learner agency through the built environment. We do this using a holistic design approach that aims to align a school’s vision, educational program, and physical environment. We have seen what happens when schools do what Todd Rose describes in The End of Average, which is to stop designing for some false middle, and rather design to reach the edges of the population. Any school community can do this, but it takes a fundamental rethinking of priorities. It starts by asking three essential questions:

1. What makes learners thrive?
2. What are the environmental characteristics that support thriving?
3. What are the barriers to thriving?

After two decades of designing reimagined schools in over 50 countries, we’ve put our own spin on question #1: what makes learners thrive. We are embedding these into the creation of a free open-source library of design patterns for thriving learners at SchoolPatterns.com. As you read, we encourage you to think about the future impact if more of our young people were to learn in environments that adapt to each person’s unique set of needs, gifts, and life experiences through these six elements.

Safety & Wellness

We can see several characteristics that nurture a feeling of safety and wellness in the image of St. Martin de Porres High School above. The soft seating and small clusters of lockers are designed for comfort and can equally serve both individuals and family-size groups. In contrast, large banks of lockers lining a corridor require each individual to turn their back to a large, noisy group of peers, making it difficult for meaningful interactions and a barrier to a sense of safety and wellness.

The wood-paneled partial wall at the center provides a solid, comforting edge to the soft-seating area. The view outside to trees and the city offers students a sense of connection to something larger than themselves, as well as a long vista that allows them to change their eye’s focal length–essential to eye health. The generous work surface in the foreground invites students to carve out their own space and spread out their work, while the green planter in the foreground provides a soft and oxygen-enhancing edge to the work counter.

Many of the physical security measures go unnoticed by the untrained eye, including mechanisms to layer access inside and outside the building. This is international – good design in this domain creates spaces that foster movement, well-being, and social connections without sacrificing physical safety.

Purpose & Joy

We can see several characteristics that nurture a feeling of purpose and joy in the image of the Academy of the Holy Names Middle School above. The varied seating and desk styles and arrangements invite students to be intentional about their purpose–to work independently, to collaborate actively, or read quietly.

Abundant natural light in conjunction with low-glare general lighting, complimentary wall surface colors, and sparks of colorful accent lighting contribute to an atmosphere of joyful, human-centered beauty rather than institutional sameness.

The generous arched window offers a dramatic visual connection to the world outside. Multiple doorways to the left offer fluid connections to adjacent spaces and learners. Together with a light-filled room, learners feel a sense of safe enclosure and stimulating and uplifting connections–key building blocks of purpose and joy.

Curiosity & Mastery

We can see several characteristics that nurture a feeling of curiosity and mastery in the image of Mound Fort Innovation Center above. Round tables near large windows invite learners to engage each other in conversations about their own questions, aspirations, and the needs of the world around them. Standing height workbenches with space on all four sides allow learners to gather, define problems, brainstorm solutions, and create prototypes.

Wide openings between spaces with overhead glass doors welcome learners to explore the work of multiple groups while providing the flexibility to focus, with the doors down, or engage adjacent groups with the doors open. A high, open ceiling provides a sense of space and freedom to explore problems, a diversity of solutions, and to see the big picture with an open mind. Mobile tool carts, restocked to support the needs of changing, interdisciplinary projects, arm students to gain mastery in their chosen challenges.

Love & Belonging

A variety of spatial elements foster a feeling of love & belonging in the image of High School for Recording Arts above. At the center, the Learning Commons serves as the beating heart of the Learning Community, with soft seats, gathering and performance areas, abundant natural light, and views to the city. The variety of adjacent activity zones and diversity of views provide a sense of belonging and connectedness.

The Learning Commons is surrounded by Learning Studios where each student belongs to an advisory group of 12-18. The advisory groups are small enough to allow each student to develop strong relationships with each other and an adult advisor. High-back couches in the heart provide a sense of enclosure and individual space, tempering the potential for over-stimulation by the variety of activity zones and visual connections.

Glass overhead doors connecting Learning Studios to the central Learning Commons allow advisory groups to operate in a quieter, cozier mode or to connect to the larger community. Even with the doors closed, the visual connection provides a sense of belonging to a larger group. (This is in contrast to the “cells and bells” classroom and corridor model, where classrooms are siloed).

As one of our oldest clients and co-located in the Twin Cities, we’ve had the opportunity to connect with many HSRA students and alumni. It’s been incredible how many times over the years we’ve heard some version of, “that school saved my life.” When we dig into what was so valuable about the experience, it almost always comes down to a feeling of love & belonging through authentic relationships with teachers and peers.

Autonomy & Opportunity

A variety of sensory-rich activity zones inside, and direct access to equally engaging outdoor learning spaces outside, provide choice and opportunities for young learners at the YCIS Early Learning Center in Shanghai.

Curved wooden platforms at various heights evoke the varied topography found in nature. Students choose paths and spaces with autonomy rather than satisfying requirements for “seat time.” Platform edges and soft floor cushions serve as additional seats–learners have the opportunity to choose the type and location where they sit and how they engage their work and each other.

Large windows connect students visually to outdoor water play, topographically varied outdoor learning spaces, and a musical discovery structure; all engaging children’s sense of adventure, opportunity, and autonomy.

Nature & Beauty

A universal yearning and priority that we hear in experiences with learners around the world is the desire for more connections to nature. As we engage in deeper discussions across cultures, we also hear that the surprising, ever-changing patterns in nature represent the essence of beauty, spirituality and connectedness.

The new entry at Singapore American School, pictured above, evokes nature through the organically shaped petal forms, the natural wood cladding, the randomly angled column forms, and the green vines above. Nature, beauty and a place to gather and connect grounds us in the beauty of common values and who we are as human beings.

Conclusion

What do spatial design patterns have to do with the events in the US Capitol on January 6, 2021? What role can education play to create conditions that counteract the forces that led to the Insurrection? How are we going to cultivate a generation of civically-minded problem solvers who are ready to take on the challenges facing humanity throughout the 21st-century and beyond? These questions boil down to what we most desire out of our schools. If we desire the six elements for thriving learners, we have to actively design for them. This can be done, but isn’t going to depend on individual heroes or a new policy mandate. It’s going to be done locally, with groups of young people, educators, parents, and community members coming together, discussing, and taking action on the three essential questions:

1. What makes learners thrive?
2. What are the environmental characteristics that support thriving?
3. What are the barriers to thriving?

We at Fielding International have seen the real-time effects of thriving learners. Kids and teachers have stronger relationships; they feel safe and loved; they pursue learning opportunities of relevance and meaning; they are healthy in mind, body, and spirit. These schools are cultivating a holistic ecosystem that gives kids opportunities to contribute to a thriving pluralistic society and healthy planet.

And a natural byproduct of this: kids who learn in these environments are primed to squash hatred, misinformation, ungrounded conspiracies, and extreme tribalism. We believe the long-term effects of this are existential and beyond measure. That’s why we are making our Design Patterns for thriving learners freely accessible to anyone, anywhere at SchoolPatterns.com.

If we can be helpful in your pursuit of environments where learners thrive, please reach out to us.

Nathan Strenge is a Senior Learning Designer at Fielding International, USA Country Lead at HundrED, and Founding Board Chair of Exploration High School. He can be reached at nathan.strenge@fieldingintl.com or found on LinkedIn.

The post 6 Elements of Thriving Learners appeared first on Getting Smart.

Jane Jacobs, in her seminal work “The Death and Life of Great American Cities,” identified a key element of safe, vital communities as “eyes on the street” — the presence of people with a visual connection to the building entry.

Two problems work against a welcoming presence: one, a tendency to create grandiose, institutional entries rather than human-centered spaces, and two, the need for a strategy to address violent threats.

People don’t tend to congregate in the center of large open spaces–instead, they hug the edges, and look for the small amenities that support human comfort. A canopy with protection from rain and sun, places to sit, views to people learning and socializing inside, and a view to an administrative office are all key elements that create a welcoming entry.

Increasing violence in schools during the late 20th and early 21st centuries has spurred the science of Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED). Layered access and natural surveillance, an extension of eyes on the street, are core design principles for safe campuses. As the sketch below illustrates, there is always at least one layer of security to public spaces, and two layers of security to Learning Communities.

The sketch below is a conceptual view of the elements of a welcoming entry, strong indoor-outdoor connections, layered access and learning communities working together in harmony.

The campus concepts for a welcoming entry are also illustrated in the photograph below of Texas Tech University Costa Rica on San Jose’s Avenue Escazu, where living, working, and learning are holistically integrated

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