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Annual Conference, HES, Sheffield

Annual Conference, HES, Sheffield. 4-6/12/09 (HL notes)

‘Putting Education in its Place’ Space, place and materialities in the History of Education  

Friday: Keynote lecture 1: Andrew Saint  

1920 had 70 open air schools (TB, antibiotics. Battersea Park 1917). Post 1945 primary schools became lighter and airier

The sense of community stops at primary school. When there is a commute to school there is no sense of community.

Session D. Pedagogic Spaces 

Roy Kozlovsky: Rhythmic self-regulation: Alfred North Whitehead’s Philosophy of Education and the Architecture of the Post-War School  

Education, its origin

- Nurture/ maternal definition. Physical and emotional growth

- debate, ‘Educare’ Latin

Whitehead: Learning has a rhythm and is cyclic

David Medd: Circulation spaces- vibrant and contrasting colours.

Long corridors are ‘institutional’

Roberta Lucente and Ida Recchia: The role of ‘core-space’ in early years education architecture through the Italian modern and contemporary heritage  

‘Core-space’- common, collective open space can be interpreted as a reiteration of the tradition Italian Piazza (Warwick has exactly this)

A place for educational experimentation, symbolic meaning, exercise, ceremony, celebration and political values

Sensorial qualities- a communicative and narrative capacity of architecture

 Val Wood

- Children’s voices absent from nurseries. Should we have some student stories? 

Saturday:  Session C. Reading School Buildings  Peter Blundell Jones: Learning to read the organisation of buildings, and the dream of ‘architecture parlante’  

The rules and rituals of rooms change. Buildings do not dictate patterns of use- the use differs from the architect’s intentions.

There are layers of use- can compare to other rooms

Buildings carry memories of former use- personal memories evoked when revisit old school- the memories are of/ in buildings and layered.

Buildings mark out territory and are autonomous- bring together or divide

More influenced by buildings at the unconscious level

The ‘architecture and ritual’ view- the need to consider the beliefs and presumptions of the user… set the field for engaging the building in the long term because buildings carry memories and suggest a course of action, setting and maintaining precedent.  

Peter Cunningham: a note on oral histories: buildings provide a common core experience. They trigger memories, although memory can be unreliable. The curriculum changes and the more eccentric are remembered.

Jeremy Howard: Picture School: Decorated School Surfaces as Lessons  

Decorates surface = display in schools and how they impact on psychology of the school experience

Official and unofficial display- graffiti

Are pupils asked what theme of art should be in school?

Learn through decoration of school- what you are there for. Identity- emblems and narratives of…

- What you will learn

- Physical education

- Knowledge is power

- Acknowledge it is hard to learn 

Pupils participate in decoration of their own schools and playgrounds post WW2

Class photos- Where? How operates?

Contacts: Nancy G. Rosoff, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, USA. nrosoff@camden.rutgers.edu

Tags
schools, Conference

Burke, C. (2005) ‘“The School Without Tears”: E. F. O’Neill of Prestolee’, History of Education, Vol. 34, No. 3, pp. 263-275

ABSTRACT: Using archival research and content analysis of photos, Burke examines how the head teacher at Prestolee Elementary school in Lancashire - E. F. O’Neil - used both pedagogy and school building design to promote a positive learning experience based on ‘freedom’ and ‘learning through doing’

Page 264:1. O’Neill’s aim was to develop the innate characteristics of children at play in order to maximise their educational potential. Thus, rather than pedagogy and the built environment imposing their conception of learning upon children, O’Neill’s vision was to harness pupils’ in-built skills by catering to their needs.L.E: This is similar to the ‘user-centred’ design principles of David and Mary Medd. 

Page 265: ‘The Thrill of the Classroom’2. O’Neill – no college qualifications, refused to physically punish children, adopted the philosophy of ‘learning through doing’. However, this practical approach to education was not permitted during the formal school day by the government at this time (1910-20), and so O’Neill had to practice his experimental teaching methodology after school.

3. Early 20th Century pedagogy – focus on the material and physical conditions of teaching spaces. Dewey (1897) My Pedagogic Creed; ‘[…] education as a process of living rather than a preparation for life […]’ – the argument that the formalism of education system stifled children’s creativity and educational potential.

4. Other key names in 20th Century pedagogy – Maria Montessori, Holmes and Hawker – 1914 British Montessori Society, set up first conference on ‘New Ideals in Education’ which supported the ideal of the built environment promoting freedom. 

Page 266: ‘Challenging the Classroom’ 5. ‘The classroom predicates the arrangement of bodies in space around notions of authority and deference.’ O’Neill wanted to break free of these artificial distinctions of power through active, practical learning.L.E: This is obviously still a popular principle today, with great emphasis being placed on undergraduate research to support the ‘learning through doing’ approach, rather than relying on the ‘spoonfeeding’ method employed by some tutors.

6. Evidence for an official challenge against the classroom made by the Board of Education in 1898, arguing the classroom was not conducive to the modern industrial world and should therefore be replaced by workshops where student interaction was encouraged. Dewey and Parkhurst described this as ‘active learning’.L.E: Doesn’t this sound a lot like the ‘social learning’ environments that Oxford Brookes and Warwick are attempting to create today??? 

Page 267: 7. ‘Active learning’ promoted through freedom. Restrictive classroom emblematic of hierarchical education system e.g O’Neill outlines the ‘Punch and Judy’ and ‘Chalk and Talk’ teaching styles that render children passive ‘absorbers’.

8. Restrictive classroom also representative of social hierarchy of outside world e.g w/c children receive orders from m/c teachers. This is an example of social reproduction for a capitalist society – shouldn’t education challenge this and promote social mobility? Has this successfully been confronted by modern pedagogy?

9. Classroom environment characterised materially by the physical division of children from the teacher and the separation of different stages of the learning process; and atmospherically with classroom activities based on fear and humiliation, with the tutor as dictator. 

Page 268 – ‘Let Teachers be Spacious’ 10. ‘Let teachers be spacious’- i.e allow tutors to reorganise the built environment to challenge and ‘emancipate’ children from the established dictatorial pedagogy of the classroom.

11. E.g O’Neill used the school hall in Prestolee as an open plan learning space, with subjects and their resources placed on different tables. This allowed children access to their own method of learning in an environment where subjects were not separated, thus promoting interdisciplinary and interaction based ‘active learning’.L.E: Using Allen’s (2003) definition of power being a mobilisation of resources, O’Neill clearly recognised the importance of giving students ownership of their own learning via open access to resources such as books, and therefore moving away from teachers as all powerful dictators, to tutors as facilitators/providers of resources, empowering children to use them and learn as they see fit. 

Page 270 – ‘The Experiment in Practice’12. At Prestolee, there was emphasis on the responsibility of children for their own learning and the maintenance of the built environment, shown by a loose and fluid timetable that students could negotiate with tutors.

13. Also emphasis on the building of practical objects which children could actually use; students encouraged to disassemble school furniture to create an environment which they had built themselves according to their own needs. This established a sense of ownership for their learning space.

14. Teacher and pupil division at Prestolee became blurred as the focus was on communal responsibility. 

Page 272 – ‘The Evolution of a New System over Time’15. Prestolee prided itself on the freedom of time, space, and learning, with children in control of their own education. E.g interview with 13 year old Muriel Kidd, a pupil at Prestolee, illustrates how students were encouraged to independently research what they didn’t understand, and were given the opportunity to study for up to 12 hours a day if they so wished.

16. This system was criticised by the LEA, meaning the school had to introduce some formal teaching of key subjects. However, pupils were permitted to interact and help one another in a non-classroom setting. 

Page 273 – ‘The Outdoor Environment’17. At Prestolee there was no division between inside and outside, work and play, boys and girls. This fluidity was designed to promote freedom and research based learning e.g Sawyer (1944) ‘Do things, make things, notice things, arrange things, and only then reason about things.’L.E: Therefore, the built environment of the institution should make this research driven learning possible. For example, the Reinvention Centre at Warwick provides the floor space, computer technology, and presentation resources to make Sawyer’s vision a reality.

18. As a result of this open spaces approach, O’Neill challenged the idea that the LEA and Board of Education should define the curriculum. Prestolee illustrated that it could be shaped by the children’s own activities and interests.L.E: This is very similar to the ‘reflexive learning’ pedagogy of today. 

Page 274: Conclusion - 19. Pedagogy of freedom and active learning embedded in a flexible built environment based on minimal supervision.

20. Prestolee experiment ended with the Education Reform Act of 1944 which abolished elementary schools.

21. Excellent summarising quote to illustrate how architecture and pedagogy are inexplicably interlinked; ‘[…] one teacher’s (O’Neill) appreciation of the significance of the built environment and the material context of the school, combined with a view of the child as innovator, constructor and researcher of his/her own world, could act as a powerful pedagogical instrument.’ Research Leads – look into:Dewey (1897) – My Pedagogic Creed.British Montessori Society.‘New Ideals in Education’ conference and its history.Education legislation from 1900s to present today which may have influenced the built school environment.     

Laura Evans

Date
Wednesday, 05 August 2009
Tags
Pedagogy, 1920s, Prestolee Elementary, Schools, Catherine Burke, E.F O'Neill

Burke, C. (2005) ‘Containing the School Child: Architectures and Pedagogies’, Paedogogica Historica, Vol. 41, No. 4, pp. 489-494

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

Date
Wednesday, 05 August 2009
Tags
Pedagogy, EERA, Schools, Catherine Burke, 2000s

From Butler to Blunkett and Beyond - School Building in England and the role of the A&B branch

By Andy Thompson
Deputy Head, Architects and Building Branch
In 1949 Architects and Building Branch was established in the English Ministry of Education. The
Development Group, within the Branch, was one of the first truly multidisciplinary organisations charged
with research, building theory, collaboration and experiment. For 50 years the Branch has seen
governments come and go and the ministry itself renamed the Department of Education and Science,
Education and currently Education and Employment. As political imperatives have changed the Branch
has responded to the challenges. At the start of the 21st century “A&B Branch” is very different in size
and scale to the organisation founded halfway through the 20th century. But apart from the name the
underlying principle of A&B has remained the same; this is to bring together architects, educationalist
and policy administrators, to “lay down general principles, guidance and advice combined with empirical
investigation and experiment”(Saint)1. Through both centralist and de-centralist administrations A&B has
retained a role in national government helping to foster innovation in school design.  Full pdf report
Tags
1950s, schools

Mary Medd Obituary; The Guardian, 24th June 2005 – Andrew Saint and Lynne Walker

· Wife of David Medd, yet her father was perhaps her biggest influence. As a medical inspector and representative on the Board of Education, he firmly believed in the EDUCATION OF THE WHOLE CHILD. This could be facilitated through teaching itself and also the environment in which it is carried out.

 

·  Influenced by Swedish design based on:

  • ·          Simplicity
  • ·          Straightforwardness
  • ·          User centrality – Medd’s educational background gave her access to the best teachers’ classrooms meaning she could systematically observe the needs of both students and tutors. Is this the case today? Or are new learning spaces too obsessed with new technology and attracting prospective students than they are with day to day functionality?

    ·          E.g Burleigh Infants – Cheshunt. Consisted of 3 square prefab classrooms separated by play courts. Thus, clearly the austerity of post-war Britain and lack of resources influenced the built environment and – where schools are concerned- the pedagogy of the time.

·  Another contributor to Medd’s work was the Ministry of Education’s Architects and Building Branch. Aimed to meet student and teacher needs via subtle, modulated spaces to create a child centred environment enabling child centred education.

·  Research leads from this information:
  • ·          Find photos/visit Burleigh Infants
  • ·          Contact Ministry of Education – Architects and Buildings Branch.
  • ·         Research pedagogic theory that informed Medd’s designs

Laura Evans

 

Date
Friday, 17 July 2009
Tags
Mary Medd, Pedagogy, schools

Paechter, C. (2004) ‘Spatialising Power Relations in Education’, Pedagogy, Culture and Society, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp. 467-474

N.B This article is a review of Allen’s (2003) Lost Geographies of Power. 

Page 467 – Introduction: 1. Allen’s (2003) argues that power is ‘spatial’ i.e is exercised through the manipulation of the physical environment, whereas other writers such as Weber and Foucault have argued space is a ‘supportive feature’ of power relations rather than intrinsic to its workings and definition.

2. Allen is particularly interested in the issues of proximity and reach. L.E: Can the theory of proximity and reach be applied to the classroom? Students are packed into a small space of regimented desks, whilst the tutor has a separate desk area and space at the front of the room to operate. Thus, those with less space and in a closer proximity to one another are in an inferior position to those who do; in other words the pupils are inferior to their teacher. 

Page 468 – A Topographical Approach to Power; Allen’s 4 Key Points: 3. Key Point One: Power is not a separate entity waiting to be used. Those who seem to possess power are in fact those with the greatest access to resources, which in turn allows them to exercise power as they have greater command of knowledge and materials. However, when these resources are used collectively, power can be exercised for the greater good rather than as an oppressive force. L.E: E.g in an educational setting, the tutor appears to have exclusive access to resources and controls their use, dictating what students should use and when the resources should be employed, leaving teachers in a position of power. However, in higher education, students are given greater access to resources which they can pursue independently, essentially meaning college and university students have greater power over their education, but is this really the case? For instance, resources could also refer to the very furniture used within a classroom, which is normally positioned and designed to facilitate the desired pedagogy of the tutor, rather than enhance the learning experience for the students. Yet, the Reinvention Centre clearly challenges this with flexible and modular furniture, an idea also mirrored in the 1920s at Prestolee Elementary school (see Burke, 2005a).

4. Key Point Two: Power cannot be divorced from its effects i.e power exercised via mobilisation of resources cannot be considered ‘power’ unless it is implemented effectively. This is further evidence for ‘power’ being part of a process of human interaction (the process of resource movement) rather than an entity in itself. L.E: Thus, although the possession of resources and so power lies in the hands of the teacher, it does not always mean that the students acknowledge this, and may even resist it. Therefore, we must not view learning spaces as settings of pre-determined power relations, but instead observe and interview teachers and students as active agents in the negotiation of space and power relations. 

Page 469: 5. Key Point Three: The nature of power changes over space and time. L.E: In an educational setting, the classroom was initially employed as a pedagogic device to assert a dictatorship style of teaching, or power as a form of domination. Yet today, following changes in legislation and pedagogic trends, space is used by teachers to harness students’ abilities i.e power as manipulation.

6. Power is based on proximity and reach, or closeness and influence across geographical space. Allen (2003) argues this can be both physical and topographical i.e not just about spatial power relations, but relations in terms of associations with other people across the world. L.E: So, apply this to learning spaces, and this would mean that local classroom spatial power relations are reinforced by the fact this pedagogic power model is being used by many teachers within the same institution, and also across institutions in different parts of the country. In other words, the prevalence of the ‘ideal’ classroom architecture and furniture in turn reinforces its pedagogic power. 

Page 470: 7. Key Point Four: Power must be analysed as a product of its actual rather than intended effects. L.E: So, we cannot judge a learning space by its intention to reduce tutors’ power, but whether it actually does this e.g the Reinvention Centre. 

Page 470 – Applying this Conception of Power to Educational Sites: 8. Paechter (2004) goes on to apply these four principles to the design of school buildings, in particular Victorian board schools. These structures were characterised by: segregation of the sexes and year groups using separate entrances and staircases; classrooms built around a central hall; and windows low enough for adults to see into, but too high for children to see out.

9. This arrangement was based on the panoptic vision of architecture for public buildings in the early 1900s, which were designed to promote institutional power via segregation, surveillance, and the domination of inmates’ bodies

Page 471: 10. However, using the modern definition and legislation of education, the architectural panopticon of the 1900s is used in such a way to create spaces of independent learning for children with less surveillance. Thus, the same resource (the school building) has been mobilised in a different way to produce different pedagogic effects, proving that spatial power is not inherent in school architecture.

11. Yet, Paechter argues the ‘metaphorical panopticon’ still exists via the inspection process. The ‘performance panopticon’ forces teachers and students into the favoured teaching style and so power relations, of the inspector, due to inspectors’ power over resources i.e their ability to shut down the school. 

Research Significance: 1. Acknowledge that when examining educational spaces, the original and intended use of resources might not be its actual use today.

2. This not only supports the need to examine spaces and how they have evolved over time spatially, and thus in terms of power, but also highlights the importance of regarding students as active agents within these spatial power relations that might not always work; through interviews for example.

 Laura Evans

Date
Wednesday, 05 August 2009
Tags
Pedagogy, Schools, Power Relations

Peter Kraftl (2005) Building an Idea

Interesting article from critical gegraphy literature which show how ideas and ideals (he is looking at 'childhood') are constructed through architectural and building practices. He reviews the literature and uses an ethnographic study of a Stainer school in Wales to show how the ideas and ideals which Steiner education has of children (and education) are designed and realised int he building and the practices situated in the buildings.

There are lots of potentially useful parallels with our overall research questiosn and I found myself paraphrasing Krafly to reformulate his ideas in our own research context. For example:

What ideas and ideals about higher education, the university and the university student, are constructed through the design and building of the University of Warwick?

CL

What ideas and ideals about university pedagogy are constructed through the design and building of the University of Warwick?

In what ways do these idea(l)s and their possible manifestations into the built environment change over time?

What are the 'performative'  and 'gestural' features of the University's architectural forms?

The whole article can be accessed via the library's journal online system : Kraftl, P (2005) Building an Idea: the material construction of an ideal childhood, Transactions of the INstitute of British Gegraphers, 31 (4): 488-504.   

Date
Friday, 30 October 2009
Tags
Pedagogy, Conference, mrc photographs, Schools, 2000s, architecture, 1960s

Press release on classroom design

A study by Newcastle University on the progress of classroom design and critiques the success of government spending on classrooms.
Tags
schools, 2000s

The Impact of school enviroments: A literature review

Introduction The Design Council is has funded a team within the Centre for Learning and Teaching at Newcastle University for the period June 2004- March 2006 to evaluate the impact of Schools Renaissance and to explore the context of school environmental design. The literature review, jointly funded by CfBT, was led by Steve Higgins and Elaine Hall and has been completed and published (Higgins et al 2005). The empirical project is working with up to 12 schools over three years to explore how school procurement processes can be aligned with a clearly-defined educational vision and is led by Kate Wall and Elaine Hall. The project has aimed to refocus schools’ thinking about environmental design through a process of ‘design immersion’ which allows context-specific problem identification and solution generation. Particular innovations have been implemented in each school and the effects on teacher and student engagement, motivation and affect monitored. Research paradigm Our work draws on traditional evaluative approaches, including the use of cross-project research tools, as well as incorporating some elements of practitioner enquiry, in partnership with the teams of teachers in the project schools. Research methodology Pupil questionnaires and staff interviews have been completed by all project schools. In addition, video of students and teachers using the newly designed areas of the schools has been collected. Individual schools have used a range of questionnaire, object-focused analysis, pupil views, interview and monitoring data to explore the experience and impacts of change. Publications Higgins, S., Hall, E., Wall, K., Woolner, P. and McCaughey, C. (2005) The impact of school environments: a literature review. London: Design Council/ CfBT.
Tags
schools, 2000s