Space and Learning: A case study of their interaction

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Examensarbete

15 högskolepoäng, grundnivå

Space and Learning: A case study of their

interaction.

Dónal Gaynor

Lärarexamen 180hp Handledare: Ange handledare

Lärarutbildning 90hp 2014-06-03

Examinator: Jan Härdig

Handledare: Ola Fransson LÄRANDE OCH SAMHÄLLE

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Abstract

This essay examines the relationship between spatial and pedagogical environments in post-secondary education in Sweden. The essay uses a case study to examine in a particular school the nature of these interactions. By examining this case using ethnographic methods including walking tours and interviews the essay gains an insight into how the physical environment interacts with the learning environment in the school. The research identifies four main points of interaction. The need for ownership of space, the quality of the study environment, the atmosphere of the school and the need for privacy. These areas of interaction are identified also within the research with teaching staff at the school. From this research there appears to be evidence in favour of open school models which have significant variation and flexibility of space to allow for both teachers and students to adapt the environment to their various needs. The open school model does however invite significant benefits in terms of non-formal learning situations and new forms of interaction between teachers and students.

Key words: design interaction, learning environment, open schools, physical environment, pedagogical environment, school design, spatial environment, study environment.

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Introduction

Children of a school age spend significant amounts of their time in school buildings. As Törnqist (2005: 11) argues the built environment affects equally the search for knowledge as it does the social life of our students. We give young people clear signals of their value to society by the way we design and invest in the spaces they occupy for large parts of their day. Despite all of this there is little direction in the laws of Sweden into how a school should be designed. The highly decentralised nature of the school system in Sweden means that there is, to a large extent, no central control of how buildings are designed. In addition, the presence of free schools in the system has led to many schools being outside of the control of the local authority. This multiplicity of school forms has led to a multiplicity of different types of school buildings, often guided by a pedagogical concept.

Teacher training in Sweden like the legal structures that govern schools does not place much, if any, focus on how the school building affects those who are there for extended periods of time (Earthman 2004). While our schools are primarily focused on the needs of the young people who go there, a second group who are in the school environment for extended periods of time are the teachers. It is hard to imagine that a school environment that is bad for teachers can be good for the students they are teaching.

Thus this essay will aim to examine the interaction of the spatial and pedagogical aspects of the modern Swedish school.

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Aims and Research Question

Aims

This essay shall discuss how a good school is designed. It will also analyse a school in the south of Sweden from this design focused perspective. The aim is to understand how school design can affect the learning environment in a school and what it is that teachers and students can do in their own schools to reach an optimal learning environment.

This essay aims to generate an understanding of how a school should be designed and what it is that effects the usage of schools already built today. As the majority of schools are pre-existing buildings and not being newly built the essay will also examine how teachers and students can affect the environment they are in for large parts of the day.

As previously stated a case study of an existing school with be used. This case study will take a relatively newly designed school which has a clear pedagogical concept and examine how that can give us insight into the problems and opportunities that can exist in a Swedish school today.

Research question

This essay examines the question of:

 What sorts of interactions can be seen between the spatial and pedagogical environment of a school?

 Is a spatial design concept a risk to a good pedagogical environment in a school?

Limitations

This essay will place several limits on the data it considers. The essay will only examine the post compulsory upper secondary education, known as gymnasieskola in Swedish. The reason for this limitation is that children in different ages have different needs from their physical environment

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and therefore it is not practical to attempt to take account of the wide ranges of different needs in an essay of this scope.

This essay also chooses to use a single case study of a school in the South of Sweden. This is partially for practical reasons of access and available time, but it is also because a case study cannot hope to be representative. As case studies cannot be representative there is a limited benefit for the research in studying several schools. Thus the choice has been made to use the single case study as a way of examining the use of a specific built environment.

This essay will also not focus on the measurable environmental qualities of the school. While the quality of the physical environment from the point of view of air quality, or light levels are of import to how well a school functions they are not the focus of this essay. This essay will focus on the physical environment and interaction of spatial aspects of the school with the experiential aspects of those who occupy and use the space. The focus of the essay is on the pedagogical experience not the physical comfort that the building offers.

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Literature review

Pedagogical environment

The basic question one must first answer if one intends to study the spatial environment in a school is, is it important or interesting in any way? The short answer is yes. Earthman (2004) explains that there is a large body of evidence that it is of crucial importance what kind of spatial environment school children are spending large portions of their day. He argues that there is a direct link between the design of schools and the acquisition of knowledge. Schools should create places which students want to spend time, they must be attractive in the same way that cafés or other public spaces must be (Bunting, 2004). This argument fits within the tradition of ‘open schools’ in which,

”traditional classrooms must change and proposes a model of a generic space for students to be co-located with teachers, which are decorated by the

students to give them ownership, and teachers and students only move when necessary to access specialised space” (Bunting, 2004: 11-12).

The open school is ‘owned’ by its studetns, it is their place to form and be creative within. In an open school the students discover knowledge themselves and learning is an active process in which the teacher is only one of the many active components. Sanoff (1994: 47) presents an argument that youth need variation in their schools. Young people have a need to be able to perform different kinds of learning activities in diferent physical environment throughout the day. There is also a need for creation of spaces for “self explortation” in which young people can learn about their own interests and strengths in a non-formal setting. He argues also that it is important for young people to be able to develop self confidence through being able to physically shape and alter their own environment; he uses as an example outdoor recreation areas that the students have been active in designing and reforming through use.

Bearing in mind the type of school environment that is promoted by the open school model one would expenct that modern schools are those schools that are then best able to deliver this type of flexibility and therefore be the most appreciated model of a school. Törnquist (2005), describes research that has questioned teachers about which shcools are best adapted to the needs of students today. This research has shown that schools built from the 90s onwards are better adapted than those built in

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the 60s and 70s, but are no better adapted than those of the 30s and 40s. Is it possible that we have gone back to older ideas of how a school should be built and what it is for? Or have the schools of the 90s sloved problems that didn’t exist in the schools from before the 50s? Törnquist (2005: 19) suspects that archetetroral details such as large rooms and beautiful windows lead to teachers overlooking the problems that the older schools from the 30s and 40s have. The locale are perceived to be adapted to the use that they have on a day to day basis when in reality it is likely that the use has simply been adapted to the locale that is avaliable.

What is a pedagological environment? According to Krupinska (1992: 20-23) pedagological environments are more than just classrooms, she maintains that one must pay attention to the social realtions that are created within the physical space of the school. Thus non ‘teaching’ rooms become part of the pedagologcial environment. This can be areas where the students are mixing with the teachers such as corridors, libraries and dining halls. It can also be areas where students are socialising each other, for example study rooms, corridors and social spaces in and arround the school building. The pedagogocial environment that is a dificult object of study to define. It can broadly be described as the physical and social environment in which students learn. This is however too broad a definition for this essay since it also includes the home and other social envionrments in which students find themselves. Thus for this essay the concept of pedagolgocial environment will be restricted to the physical and social environment within the school building where students learn.

Ørestads Gymnasium in Ørestad just outside Copenhagen has a pedogological concept that has the realities of the modern workplace as its main focus. The school building is therefore built to give a physical expression of this concept. The school is dominated by open classrooms that can be re-shaped to suit the needs of either small groups, large classes or even individual work spcaes. It is heavliy emphasised in their pedagological model and in information to studnets applyin to the school that they are expected to take responibility for creating a working environment. There are also expectations that students will respect other students working needs but themselves be able to concentrate in open spaces (Ørestads Gymnnasium, 2014). This model raises some interesting questions. Is the model of Ørestads Gymnasium one that has placed the learning needs of students first or the realities of the modern working place? It may be that

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students will learn better in another type of working environment, but that has to be sacrificed to gain a ‘realistic’ working environment in the school. This is an example of what is becoming increasingly common in modern school design, that the school is designed to the concept and not the concept to the needs of the users of the school. It has also been demonstrated that high levels of noise in a classroom lead to high stress and poor concentration amongst students, and that by activly reducing these noise levels students gain better results and are less stressed (Norlander et al, 2005).

In the 1970s the dominating strain of school design was for the open classroom, while this school of design is no longer as dominant it is still seen as highly attractive. This movement not only had the design of open work spaces with no walls as its focus, but also open communication between teachers and students, and students in different age groups. While there is no one single definition of what an open classroom is (Horowitz, 1979) indicated that there is evidence that these types of models have not had a measureable effect on the knowledge leves of students they have had effects on the development of other competencies. Students who have gone to schools using open classroom models have shown a better degree of self confidence, higher levels of creativity and more interest in school work.

The importance of good architecture

How a school is designed and built send signals to all the people who are there. Investing in school buildings shows students that they are also worth investing in. Cold (2002) argues that if we have badly designed and poorly maintained schools we are showing students that we do not care about them, and that by caring about the physical building in which students will spend their time we give clear signals that we care about the students who go there.

Designing attractive schools is something that has a positive effect; those who spend their time there are effected by the environment. The aesthetic value of a school should not be underestimated, aesthetics can give students and teachers motivation to work, study and co-operate with each other in many different ways (Törnquist, 2005: 16 – 17). Healey-Malinin & Parnell (2012: 14) note that,

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“Notably, student assessment of school quality correlates with adult quality

assessment (although students value aesthetics over structural quality.) The students in this study are clearly aware of the quality of their school

environment and this affects their perception of their ability to succeed.”

It is also the case that the physical environment controls behaviour to a cerain degree. For example as Krupinska (1992: 1) says, it is almost impossible to behave as if one were on a football pitch when one is in a church. It is a recongnised role of the schooling system to play a role in raising society’s children, even if this role is something that is argued over and the degree of responsibility is questioned. If architetture effects our behaviour it is natural that the place we legistlate that our young people must spend a majority of their time should be designed with this in mind.

What affects today’s school design?

Chapter 5 of the school law of Sweden (SFS, 2010: 800) has no regulations about how a school should be designed it does include the following direction (translation author’s own):

3 § Education shall be designed in such a way that all pupils are guaranteed a school environment that is characterised by security and a good study

environment.

4 § The law on working environments (1977: 1160) contains rules and

minimum standards for a good working environment. In certain questions that are associated with this law are defined in the law on working environments.

This is not particularly detailed direction for schools about how they should be built or designed, the requirements that are made concrete in the law are for security and a good study environment. What these requirements mean in practice is not further specified in the law though there is some guidance from the schooling authority in separate documentation.

Over time there has been a change in the way schools have been designed and built in Sweden. There has with the free school reform and local authority control of schooling been an increase in the variety of different schools within the Swedish system. The deregulation at the start of the 1990s means that it is no longer possible to say that schools in Sweden conform to any sort of

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national system of norms in their design or building process (Törnqvist 2005: 11). There are no centrally formulated goals dictating the form or use of school buildings. This gives parents and students greater choice of school design, but it perhaps creates new risks in the form of different local authorities prioritising schooling to different degrees. This could be a threat to the cherished model of equality in the Swedish system.

How do teachers adapt a school to their needs?

As most teachers are working in schools that are already built, it is worth discussing to what degree they are able to affect the space in which they work. Bissell (2004) identifies that teachers who activley adapt their classrooms to the pedagological needs of their students have better contact with their classes and even identifies spillover effects into how well they communicate with their colleguges. Ahrentzen & Evans (1984: 450) found that teachers activly adapted their teaching to the space in which they were working. This lead to lessons fitting the space and not the space fitting the lessons. While this is to some degree inevitable since once a school is built it is not possible to add rooms when certain lessons require them, it does indicate that there is a significant benefit to introducing a certain degree of flexibility into the design of schools. This allows for teachers to adapt the space to some degree to the students in each class.

Privacy in a public palce?

The same study (ibid:451) found that students desire for privacy could not be reached by creating individual desks or working spaces. This was primarily because of teachers restricting the use of these spaces. This kind of restriction is often placed on younger students but is not as frequently placed on older students, such as those who are the focus of this essay. Goffman (1990) devlops a sociological idea of being on-stage. This is built upon the idea that when in social situations we perform certain rolls that are expected of us. Thus when visable to students staff must behave in a certain way. Likewise students make expectations of each other. There is therefore a need for people to get “back stage” at times, This means that the performer is no longer visable to the audience, or that the individual is no longer under the gaze of others. This allows for them to be their real selves. This constant social pressure is something that exists outside of the pedagological needs of the students and must be considered in the design of a the

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space of a school. Goffman’s idea of performance and staging has been further devleoped by postmodern theorists like Butler (2007) who describes gender as a performance similar to drag acting. She maintains that in the presence of others we are constantly performing our gender to ensure acceptance and that our social roles are constructed through interaction. As previsouly noted schools aim to affect the social rolls of students, and by encouraging interaction with teachers through open design this process of roll performance will be affected. While Butler’s work has focused on gender, something that is very important to young people, it is not unreasonable to expect that other aspects of identity are also performed in a similar manner.

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Methods

Literature search

The study has started with a literature search. This search has been based on database searches using key words in both Swedish and English. The search words used included, School Design, Environment, Skola, Miljö, Klassrum, Classroom, Pedagogisk design, Design for learning and klassrumsgeografi. The searches were done using the library search engines of the Universities of Malmö and Halmstad along with the national library of Iceland and Google Scholar. The search results were used to identify interesting books and articles and then the bibliographies of those were used to find further useful material. The method described below is based principally on literature sources but to some degree on previous research experience by the author.

Case Study

This essay uses a post-secondary school in the South of Sweden for a case study. As has previously been noted a case study cannot be considered to be representative, however, it is relevant to this essay where it is being used to highlight and examine the interaction of physical space and learning. In a short essay, such as this, it is not possible to generate large scale studies which are generalizable and reliable, it is however possible to examine in some depth a single case.

The school chosen as a case is the object of study not just in the form of the physical structures but also in the form of the social structures that exist within and around it. Schools are more than just buildings they are also the people who are there, both students and teachers. Studying a particular case allows the researcher to seek to understand, “subjective meaning making” and “latent meaning structures” (Schönberger & Kardorff 2004). Schönberger & Kardorff studied how relatives of cancer patients handled stress, but their arguments are relevant in other fields such as pedagogical research. Studying a case gives a chance for the researcher to reach a deeper level of understanding, especially when social and subjective meaning making is the focus of the

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research; as it is in this case. Thus a case study is the most appropriate way to identify and examine the interaction of physical space and learning within the school environment.

Spatial analysis

This essay focuses on the spatial aspects of schools and how they interact with the pedagogical and social dimensions. The method being used is based on Bjurström & De Jong (2006) who have based their method on a research tradition which has a focus on describing the physical nature of building and investingating the connection of the physical environment with the experinces of those who are withing it (ibid, 2006: 44). This kind of research understanding buildings as a way of expressing the relationship between people. Much educational reaserach focuses on the importanace of good social relations (Aspelin, 2010, Ekstrand & Balli, 2007 & Frelin, 2012). It is therefore important to understand how the built environment can affect social relations within a school.

It is not just the actual built environment that affects how people move about within and use the space of a school. It is also of interest to understand how other people and social norms of the shared space affect those who use it. Designed space can contribute to integration or segregation of people but it can also be understood as a space where the social world is created. It is therefore important to examine not just the built environment but also the connection between it and the social worlds of those who occupy the space (Kock, 2004: 49-50).

Unlike studying light livels or air quality there are no externaly approved norms or reference values for how the social space of a learning environment should be. This reivew of previous research aims to show the possibiliteis within schools. This will then be coupled with the case study to allow for analysis and examination of how the build environment can impact the pedagological environment of a school.

The case study will have a user focuses perspective, which means that the aim is to understand the pedaglogical environment of the school through the eyes of those who use it on a day to day basis. In the case of a school that is the teachers, the students and the school management. Since

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the focus is on the pedagological environment it is the teachers and the students that will be the focus of this essay. The following sections describe how this data will be collected and analysed.

Interviews

Interviews are a method that allows the examination of complex understanding that people have of the object of study. In this case the interaction of the built environment and the pedagogical environment of a post-secondary school in Sweden. In this essay ethnographic interviews will be used. The ethnographic interview is characterised by having the air of a, “friendly conversation” where, “the researcher introduces new elements to assist informants to respond as informants” (Spradley, 1979: 58). The questions asked in an ethnographic interview aim to examine how people organise their knowledge and understanding of the object of study. These types of questions are called structural questions. A contrast is also sought using questions that examine meaning that people place into worlds, places or concepts (Flick, 2006: 166-167). An ethnographic interview is therefore a form of semi-structured interview. The researcher will before hand have prepared areas for discussion but not a complete interview schedule that must be followed rigidly. This gives the opportunity to examine and develop the interviewees’ own ideas and interests through the interview.

The interviews will, with consent, be recored, transcribed and analysed. The annalysis will take the form of a systematic review of the interview where key concepts are identified and connected with the other parts of the research. This type of annalysis allows the researcher to examine the understaing of the interactions of built and pedagological environments that the interviewees have and allows for different interview subjects to raise different, or even conflicting interpretations of the same space.

The aim is to conduct intreviews with a minimum of two teachers and three students. The teachers and students will be chosen to give a spread of age, sex, study programme and subject. The reason for seeking this spread is to give as wide ranging view of the school as possible.

Other than the ethnographic interviews an expert interview will be held with the head teacher of the school. An expert interview has as its aim to increase the knowledge level of the researcher in

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a particular field. In this case the head teacher is an expert on the school’s pedagological concept and how the school’s design aims to promote that. An expert interview is also a form of semi-structured interview, but unlike the ethnographic interview the interview schedule is more specific. The resason for this specificity is that the expert interview seeks to examine a specific field of knowledge and the interview should not be distracted by other areas. The results from this interview will be used to give information and context to the rest of the data gathered (Flick, 2006: 165).

Walking tour of the building

The aim of this study is to understand the spatial aspects of the school. Thus interviews are of limited use and experiencing the physical space with users of the space is far more useful. It is in principle impossible to experience the environment of a school from a student’s point of view, due to the power imbalance between adults and children. Thus participant observation is not an appropriate method. The method that will be used is a “walking tour” of the school. By having users of the school give the researcher a guided tour of the school before conducting an interview it is possible to gain a deeper understating of how they experience the school space. The walking tour is documented in the form of photos and notes, and concepts, subjective understanding and pedagogical meanings can be examined in more depth in an interview situation afterwards. This type of walking tour is an established ethnographic method. By sharing space with other people and experience the social interactions that arise when moving through and within the space the researcher gains a deeper understating of how the space is experience by those who use it (Pink, 2007: 244-245). In practise the walking tour is conducted by first explaining in general terms the context of the research, being careful not to suggest answers that one might want to hear. Then asking the participant to show the researcher the school especially showing areas of the school they spend significant amounts of time or places they like being and places they dislike being.

Observation

As previously described the equality of status that is required for participant observation cannot be achieved in a school environment. Thus non-participant observation is the only viable possibility. Observation as a method requires investment of large amounts of time and the

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physical presence of the researcher in the environment for extended periods. This is unfortunately not a practical possibility for this essay. A non-systemic type of observation is possible, this type of observation happens when a researcher is in an environment and remains aware and observant. The researcher can make notes or take pictures to highlight interesting things that are observed in the school. This type of observation must be used carefully since it is non-scientific and unsystematic and there is a risk that skewed or incorrect data is then incorporated into the study (Flick, 2006: 216 - 217).

Ethics

As this research involved a school and the young people who go there, there are ethical considerations to the work. Approval to conduct the research at the school for the case study has been granted by the head teacher and all teachers and the student body are aware of the author’s status as a researcher at the school. Since no covert research is being conducted there is a lower level of risk to the participants. All participants will be guaranteed anonymity and will have the possibility or withdrawing from the research at any point explained to them. The school will be to the greatest extent possible anonymised but anyone familiar with the schools of the south of Sweden will probably be able to identify which school has been used. This is a risk but there is not a significant risk of damage to individuals or intuitions and the risk is therefore acceptable. The participants in the walking tours and interviews will be aware of the aims and objectives of the research as well as how the data will be treated. Overall there is a low level of risk as long as confidentiality and data security is maintained.

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Results and analysis

The Case Study

The school being used as a case study for this essay is a post-secondary school in the south of Sweden. The school is a free school which means it is outside of control of the local authority and is part of a larger school company. The company has a clear pedagogical concept that governs how all their schools work. The aim of the school is that every student receives a wide range of different study styles. Students have individual mentoring with a teacher every week, they will then also have scheduled classes, lectures and seminars and are also expected to use the schools own online learning system to access support information and other exercises. The physical design of the school space also represents this style of learning. The schools are provided with lecture halls, classrooms, group rooms and a large shared space. The aim is for teachers and students to have a large amount of contact with each other to build good relationships. This along with the personalised mentoring aims to give students a large range of different support systems so they can succeed with their studies. The school used for this study offers only academic university preparation programmes and currently has groups in all three years in Economics, Social Science and Natural Science programmes.

The school is built around a central dining hall which doubles as a study area where “workshops” are held throughout the day, where teachers are available for all students to help with their various subjects. On the ground floor there are classrooms and group rooms around the central space and a large lecture

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theatre dividing the dining hall from the entrance foyer. The upper floor consists of a galley walkway again surrounded by classrooms and work rooms, and on a raised mezzanine level above the large lecture theatre there are a further two classrooms.

Results

The “walking tours” of the school have been conducted with students from all three year groups and a mixture of different programmes. In total 6 students have taken part in the walking tours. Due to time constraints and the need of staff to prioritise the national tests only one walking tour was conducted with a teacher.

The walking tours and interviews with the students raised four general themes:

 Ownership of space

 Quality of study space

 Privacy

 Friendliness

All the students noted at some point of their walking tour that certain parts of the school were “theirs”. Their meaning here is not that they actively tried to remove other students from that space but that the space was somewhere they felt comfortable and that would generally not be occupied by others. When

asked in their interviews about this kind of space ownership they were mostly not consciously aware of having chosen somewhere in the school to “own” but that over time it had become natural to spend their free time there. When asked

what happened if someone else was occupying the space when they wished to be there all of the students said that they would simply go and sit somewhere else. The group room pictured here,

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was considered highly desirable. On the left of the picture a normal group room can be seen, the one to the right is the group room that several students identified as a space they “own” they felt that in this group room one could only be observed by coming right up to the glass door since half the room was behind the wall.

The theme of study quality was much more varied. The students described the problems of different classrooms which will be taken up in the next section and had very different views on the usability of group rooms. The group rooms were variably described as being perfect for study or being useless for study. When students were further questioned about this the difference seemed to focus on weather students “could” study at school. Some students were unable under any circumstances study while in the school building, this they attributed primarily to the noise level but also to some degree to the problem of their being too many people, friends or other activities going on. One student described how it was impossible to settle down to study if you knew there was the possibility of doing something else more fun just outside the door. Those students who found the school well adapted for study generally also mentioned the noise level around the central dining area as being problematic but said that they chose to study at times when the school was emptier.

When asked generally about how suitable the classrooms were for study the answers were positive. The main complaint was generally about the quality of the air in classrooms (something this essay will not be considering) or about the boring nature of the classroom design. The classrooms are designed to be neutral, and flexible. Teachers at the school have to some degree a base classroom that is theirs but they are not encouraged to personalise it to a large degree. The majority of classrooms have a least one wall that is almost entirely glass which looks out onto the galley walkway or the large central dining hall. This was something that several of the students thought was problematic to

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the classroom being a good learning environment since it meant that if anything “interesting” happened outside the class room it would lead to the students no longer listening to the teacher. When students were asked directly if they preferred being in the classrooms where teachers have put up decoration or in a classroom that was not decorated, they all gave answers positive to being in a decorated classroom citing reasons of it being more interesting, nicer to look at or easier to concentrate. Many of the teachers have chosen to cover the glass walls with posters to shield their classrooms. The classroom shown above shows how a teacher in social studies has used topical newspaper articles to shield the class from the corridor on the upper level of the school.

This notion of shielding links closely with the discussion of Privacy that the students have had during their “walking tours”. This point was the only point that seemed to be connected to the student’s gender. All the female students talked about the problem the dining hall, and classrooms being “on display”. They described how they felt that they constantly had to watch what they did to avoid committing social faux pas. This feeling of being watched was most intense in the entrance foyer and dining hall, though was also present in those classrooms that can easily be seen into from outside. When asked about this phenomenon in the interviews; the male students did not recognise this as a problem that affected them in any way. The female students all connected this “problem” of being on display all the time with the need to have areas of the school that were “theirs”. They all identified group rooms or other areas that are to some degree shielded from the central areas of the school as being places one would choose to sit, even to the point of choosing to eat, socialise and study in those areas to escape openness of the rest of the school.

One aspect of the school’s open design that all the students described was its friendliness. The notion of friendliness and constantly being on display were not

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contradictory to the students. For the students the openness of the entrance foyer, the accessibility and visibility into the head and the teachers’ offices all gave the school a very friendly atmosphere. For the students who took part in the “walking tours” this notion of friendliness was vital to understanding why they had chosen to come to this school. The foyer, pictured above, was university described as being open and welcoming. They described how the openness of the space made them feel that they could ask for help, something they placed great value on. They described how the school “felt right” or was, “somewhere where they could be safe”. The second comment was investigated further in the interview with that student and she connected the safety of the school to the lack of closed off spaces. It for her meant that there were always adults around who would provide a degree of social control and ensure that students were not at risk for bullying or other unsafe behaviours from other students. This student was one of the students who experienced a sensation of being constantly on display at the school. She had not reflected on the dissonance of these two ideas and seemed happy to accept that one was a consequence of the other.

The “walking tour” conducted with a teacher at the school gave results that were to some degree similar to the students. The question of ownership of space was not relevant for her. As a teacher at the school she described feelings of the whole school being her work place and that teachers at the school were able to exert their control over any part of the environment should they feel it necessary or desirable. This is something that casual observation also confirms, that teachers readily come out into the shared areas of the school from their offices to ensure that there are no problems developing.

When conducting the walking tour with the main focus for her comments were around the quality of spaces for teaching and learning. She felt that having a large open space was highly desirable since it gave opportunity for spontaneous interaction of teachers and students. Something that gives teaching opportunities that otherwise do not arise in a more traditionally built school. The problem with having only once large open space is that it is both a social space and a teaching space. The amount of space available for teaching activities is restricted by the way that social activity “expands into the surrounding spaces”. When asked to clarify what this meant she explained that social activity takes up much more space than teaching since it is eye

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catching and generally louder. Thus students who wish to study are either distracted by the sight of social activity or unable to concentrate due to the noise level. Thus she felt that it would be most desirable to have two large areas one social and one teaching.

The notion of distraction was something that she raised in relation to classrooms as well. Her classroom is one of the classrooms with a glass wall facing the corridor that she has not previously covered with posters. This is something that she is considering doing for the next term. When asked why she hadn’t previously covered the glass but was now considering it she explained that the openness of the classroom gives a more inviting atmosphere and that she thinks that a more neutral classroom helps the students concentrate on what is happening in the lesson. It is precisely this point of having to concentrate that leads her to want to cover the glass wall. She has found that students congregate outside her class and distract others during her lessons. Thus she feels that by shielding her class she will be creating a better space for study for her students.

As noted in her description of why she had not previously shielded her classroom she experiences the open design of the school as friendly. She made similar comments to the students who described the foyer as open and welcoming and the ability to see into the head teacher’s office as inviting. She experiences the school as friendly, partly because of the open spaces and natural light but also because of the people who are there. However like the students she experiences similar problems with the lack of private spaces in the school.

The teachers work rooms are designed in the same way as the rest of the school with large glass walls and students are able to see the staff working in there. The teacher who participated in the walking tour described how she like her colleagues find this constant being “on stage” stressful and counterproductive. She explained how the staff are unable to “escape” the students and that it generates unnecessary stress and conflict when teachers are occupied and unable to answer student questions. As a result of this the teachers have painted the windows in one part of the office to make them opaque. This has created an “offstage” area where the staff can relax with each other or alone.

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From the teachers perspective the school has problems with privacy and quality of study space but she also agrees with the students that despite these issues the school has a friendly open atmosphere.

Three examples

Three classrooms where identified by several students as being either very good or very bad examples of the school.

Room 201

The first of these classrooms is room 201. Room 201 is on the second floor and as it is a corner room has only a short glass wall towards the gallery. The students who identified this room as a “good” classroom described how the ability to see outside the school was positive while there was only limited distraction from the corridor outside. Like the teacher who took part in the walking tour, the natural light was something the students commented upon. When asked why being able to see out of the building was a good thing the students made comments about it being more interesting, that it gives a “sense of reality” and that it is nice to be able to see some nature. They did not feel that it was distracting since they felt that it was other students who could be distracting, not “trees and playschool kids”.

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Arena 4

This room is somewhat of a divider of opinion in the school. The teacher presented this room as one of her favourite lecture rooms because it is free from distractions, it is not too big and it allows for a normal sized class. She also admitted that many of her colleagues dislike the room because it is not laid out as a classroom and it does not allow the teacher a chance to move around amongst the students. The room is designed as a lecture hall and not a traditional teaching space.

The students were equally divided in their opinions of this room. Of those students who identified the room as interesting during their walking tour about half said it was a terrible room because it has no natural light, the benches are too crowded and it feels very enclosed. Other students liked the room for many of the same qualities, they experienced the room as “cosy” as not being observable from outside and as being a room where it was easy to concentrate. This dichotomy gives some idea of how the same space can be experienced in totally different ways by different people.

Lab 100

Lab 100 is viewed much more negatively by the students. This room was identified as being uncomfortable, and difficult to work in. The teacher who did the guided tour did not mention this rom, and since she is not a science teacher is rarely in the space. The room is on the ground floor with a view. This however was experienced as being insufficient by most students since it was on the ground floor and therefore more restricted. Much more problematic was that other students can gather outside the windows on the outside of the building presenting a potential distraction. The students felt that they

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were in a “glass box” and could be observed from all sides, both from outside and from the dining hall/foyer area on the other side of the glass wall. The natural science students felt that the practical area at the back of the room was too small and crowded for their needs, while the social science students who use the room felt that they were being placed in a room that was not designed for their needs in any way.

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Analysis

As previously identified there were four themes that were dominant in the walking tours and interviews. These four themes were:

 Ownership of space

 Quality of study space

 Privacy

 Friendliness

The need to have control over space is something that is recognised in the literature as being important to young people. As Sanoff (1994: 47) identified it is useful for students to be able to take control of parts of their space and use it as a way to inform or express their development. In the school used for the study, the students were not formally able to adapt their environment to their needs, they were however, informally adopting control over parts of their environment. Examples of this can be seen in the choice of group rooms, or locations that students choose to gather. By choosing locations where they were not as easily observed, or where they were shielded from the rest of the school they were able to occupy the space and adapt it to their own needs. For example some students spoke of using group rooms as a place to eat lunch. Eating in group rooms is strictly against school rules, but students were using this sort of rule breaking not as a rebellion for rebellions sake but to be more comfortable. Students also display the ability to adapt to the social space they are presented with. Students reported choosing to plan study time around the usage of the building, choosing quiet times as being optimal for study. The teachers have a greater degree of power over forming their own space. It is noticeable that the teaching staff have taken active steps to decorate their classrooms where they wish to, and have altered the “architectural concept” to close off the teachers’ offices. The teachers have improvised methods for

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exerting control over their space. For example using newspapers to cover windows in their classroom or in the case of frosting the office windows, painting the glass with filmjölk1. Show in the picture on the previous page. Previously this area had been completely open to students who would regularly knock on the window to get the attention of teachers they wanted to talk to.

The “concept” of the school generates a certain degree of tension when it comes to creating a study space. The central hall is intended to be a working and socialising space. The problem encountered here is that socialising occupies much more of the space then working. Many of the students noted that they were unable to study in school and that the potential for distraction and high noise levels were problematic.As was noted by Norlander et al (2005) high levels of noise are disruptive to student learning and thus contribute to a poor study environment.

In the classroom spaces both students and teachers have found the concept of the school to be a positive and negative in terms of creating a study atmosphere. The openness facilitates communication between staff and students and gives rise to new and unexpected teaching opportunities. However, the openness also creates the potential to distraction which students find difficult to ignore. Not being able to escape this distraction leads to disrupted lessons. The case of Area 4 is an example of how this problem is experienced in the school. This room is liked by some staff and students because it eliminates the problem of distractions. It is equally disliked by other staff and students because it does not give the openness and flow of communication that the other classrooms have.

Underlying both of these discussions there is the implicit problem of privacy. In the terms of the teaching staff privacy is required to allow focus in lessons, in the sense of a collective privacy for the class and in the office space to allow for some “offstage time” where teachers can be away from students. The students equally want privacy from each other. The mistake that can be made is to see the student body as cohesive. This is not the way that they experience themselves. They find the presence of other groups of students intrusive or uninviting. The students can feel observed by others at the school and wish to escape from this gaze. The work of both Goffman

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(1990) and Butler (2007) indicates that students and teachers are going to spend significant amoutns of time having to perform for each other. The construction of identiy in these meetings is crucial to understanding why some of the students found it stressfull to be on display in the central dining hall.

The area that staff and students felt the school design had succeeded most with was the atmosphere of friendliness. Here students felt that the school was aided by its design. The large open spaces and glass walls provided a non-threatening atmosphere, and the constant presence of adults in one form or another was reassuring and supportive. The students and teachers all felt that the building and those within it were friendly and supportive to each other. The design here has succeeded in creating a social space and physical space that the users enjoy.

It seems as though the designers of the school have assumed that the student body is monolithic and thus have identical needs. This appears to be one of the biggest problems for the school in this study. Students have as much need to be away from each other as teaching staff have to be away from the students. The openness that lies as the heart of the school’s concept leads to a sensation of being constantly “on stage”. If it were possible to give students more control over parts of their environment it would probably lead to them creating “off stage” areas and this would allow them to express themselves in a different form that is currently possible. It is noticeable that staff who have a larger degree of control over their space have used this control to shield classrooms or frost the glass of the teachers’ office to create private spaces. Likewise greater flexibility in the classroom space would be appreciated. The student’s identify room 201 as a very positive room since it offered a broad range of views without having a large glass wall into the central part of the school. Arena 4 is divisive since it only offers the shielding and is not flexible in its layout, while Lab 100 offered neither flexibility nor shielding and was experienced as being the worst room available. It is therefore possible to argue that offering flexibility and shielding is something that both staff and students find beneficial.

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Discussion

The literature review has shown that there is no unified idea of how a school should be built. By studying a single school with a particular design and pedagogical concept it has been possible to look at how design and pedagogy interact. In the case of this essay there is a clear interaction. The students and teachers were generally pleased with the atmosphere of the school and found that the open design promoted social engagement. As previously described this social engagement is of great pedagogical value in the classroom and outside of it.

The school has focused on providing a multiplicity of environments where students can study or socialise, however, space restrictions mean that these environments impinge on one another. A clearer separation of the environments would benefit all involved. Both students and teachers find the distraction of people not engaged in study in the same space difficult to contend with. It is however vital that schools offer space for social interaction since this is one of the key goals of schooling in Sweden. Students must learn to share space with each other and develop social as well as academic skills.

Previous research has indicated the need for low noise and distraction levels as part of a good study environment. The school used as a case study has made compromises in this area to gain the social interaction that the pedagogical/design concept of the school uses as its main focus. A greater recognition of this in the design would have helped develop a better environment for study. The explicit inclusion of areas for quiet study is something that schools should consider.

It has also been noted that the open design of the school does work to encourage interaction between the teaching staff and the students. This kind of interaction is beneficial to both formal and informal learning. Students and teachers alike report the benefits of having contact with each other. It helps develop the social relationships which are essential in the classroom and gives rise to spontaneous moments of teaching. This gives the school a pedagogical environment that encompasses more than just the classrooms.

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 What sorts of interactions can be seen between the spatial and pedagogical environment of a school?

 Is a spatial design concept a risk to a good pedagogical environment in a school?

The essay has shown through a review of literature and through research that the spatial environment of a school has a direct effect on the pedagogical environment. That effect can be both positive and negative and is usually of a complex type.

The types of interactions that have been shown are multiple. The researcher started out without having considered the importance of student/student interactions in the space and had made an assumption that a single type of space use would predominate amongst the student body. This assumption was quickly proved false by the data gathered. In line with much of the previous research high levels of noise were problematic and students showed a significant desire to have control over their own space. The need for ownership and control of space was not just restricted to the student body and the teaching staff showed a similar desire for control over their own work spaces. The shared space of the school had many advantages and gave rise to different types of pedagogical interaction that occur in a more separated school space. Previous research (Horowitz, 1979) has indicated that this type of open school promotes a freer communication between students and teacher which facilitates innovative thinking. This study indicates that the spontaneous interaction of teacher and student outside the formalised classroom environment may be something associated with this phenomenon.

The school studied had a clear spatial design concept, which is inspired by a pedagogical concept. The physical structures of the school therefore dictate to a certain degree the pedagogical activity that takes place in the school. The study indicates that there is a need for a greater flexibility of the school design. The open school concept has given rise to many of the aimed benefits but this has been at the cost of privacy and the ability to adapt each classroom to the learning situation that is required at that moment. The inability to “close off” a classroom and thus leaving all teaching situations as being “on stage” for the whole school generate stresses for

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both teachers and students. Simple solutions to this sort of problem would be some sort of blind that could be drawn over internal windows as the teacher and students need. Likewise self-study spaces are also open for observation. This generates stresses amongst students and lowers the quality of them as working spaces. As previously noted, other than the lack of privacy in the central dining hall the main problem there is in the form of noise from social activity. Some sort of divided space or an alternative study space would benefit the school in this case. The spatial concept of the school had altered the pedagogical environment significantly. It is not necessarily so that this alteration is damaging to the students learning experience. Like all schools there is an interaction between the spatial design and the pedagogical environment. If students are to be best served it would be ideal if the design of schools started with a focus on the needs of the users. In this case the needs of a type of pedagogy have been places first, this is no worse and possibly better than placing the needs of structural planning first which has been dominant in older school buildings (Törnqvist, 2005). Using a spatial concept is not by definition a damaging idea, but it does carry a certain risk that the end users, teachers and students, are forgotten. Previous research has shown that schools which are “closed” as opposed to the modern open design are as popular as long as they have attractive architecture, something that has been explained as teachers liking the building and therefore adapting pedagogy to fit the space available. This risk exists equally in attractive modern buildings.

This study is a single case study and therefore is not generalizable. The work presented here indicates the need for more research into the interaction of space and pedagogy especially amongst older students. Much research has focused on the needs of younger children but as research in psychology and pedagogy has clearly shown students of different ages have different needs. It may be of interest to seek to see if those types of pedagogy which are more focused on the physical environment, such as Waldorf schools, give different or more interesting results.

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Space and Learning: A case study of their interaction

Examensarbete