ABSTRACT: Introduction to the journal of the European Education Research Association (EERA), which focuses on the visual history of education in order to open up research opportunities exploring how the material environment has influenced educational experience. 

Page 490: 1. EERA’s key belief is that pedagogy and the design of indoor and outdoor learning spaces (including aesthetics, materials and function) are interlinked and central to a positive educational experience. 

Page 491: 2. Although it is agreed the built environment can be used as a key pedagogical tool, in what way should it be used? How does the built environment facilitate the study of children’s behaviour? How does design education and the use of the school environment create future consumers? 

Page 492: 3. ‘Walls, canteens, corridors, desks and doors do not only act as containers of the school child; they act also as spaces for resistance and sites of contested desires.’ L.E: Therefore, it is not only specifically classroom space within an institution which needs to be considered. Moreover, pupil perception of the built environment must also be researched. 

Page 493: 4. 1937 Exhibition of Materials for Use in Elementary Schools. L.E: What influence did this have on the furniture of the classroom?

5. Educational institutions based on the ‘inverse panopticon’, or a ‘two way visualisation device of discipline and control’. This means the needs and desires of teachers and students are always in opposition with each other i.e surveillance vs. freedom. L.E: See Paechter (2004) notes for more information on the architecture of the school as ‘panoptic’. 

Page 494: 6. Must note the importance of colour, symbols, and school emblems in the ‘visual landscape’ of the school. 

Research Leads - look into: EERA work on learning spaces and pedagogy. 1937 Exhibition of Materials for Use in Elementary Schools.  

Laura Evans