Architecture of Schools: The New Learning Environments
Dudek, Mark (2000).
Boston: Architectural Press; 238 pages. $69.99. ISBN 0750635851.
Architecture of Schools: The New Learning Environments makes a substantial contribution to the perennial debate on the role of architecture in the educational process. As Mark Dudek, the author, explains,
teachers are mainly guided by their own theories on education, which on the whole take little account of architecture and space. The views of architects are often deemed irrelevant within the framework of a more general educational debate (101).
This is the position from which Dudek works, attempting throughout the book to “make the case” for the value of architecture in schools, by which he means the aesthetic and environmental qualities of the learning environment. He illustrates his arguments throughout the first half of the book, while providing additional case descriptions of 20 school buildings from Europe and North America in the second half.
Describing himself as “an informed school architect,” Dudek is a faculty member of the School of Architecture at University of Sheffield where he is the director of a design and research group that specializes in educational environments. He is also a practicing architectural consultant to the Educative Design Group that formed in 1998 as a collaborative project between educators and architects to produce an integrated childcare prototype environment in the UK context.
Architecture of Schools reads like a companion to Dudek’s earlier book, Kindergarten Architecture: Space for the Imagination (first edition, Chapman and Hall, 1996). Dudek explores the “evolving theory of school design,” and the dichotomies with which school designers have historically dealt since the rise of industrialism. The twentieth century has seen an uneven process of “de-institutionalization of the institution” of the schoolhouse, a theme that describes the rise of mass education and the continual problem of accommodating the needs of the child, needs often defined within the context of changing societal perspectives on children.
Dudek explores the recurring theme of school architects having to design large buildings for mass education while simultaneously addressing the conflicting need to create humane environments for learning. He attempts to present what he calls both the traditional and radical approaches to education and school design. Primary emphasis is placed on the views of Pestalozzi, Montessori, Steiner, Wilderspin, Froebel, and Dewey, e.g., against the backdrop of traditionalism, authoritarianism and utilitarianism. Dudek describes quite well the pendulum swing from the austere architecture and educational theories of the eighteenth century to the increasing influence of these early innovative educators who introduced ideas founded in child psychology on the form of the modern schoolhouse structure and culture. Dudek covers a broad range of seminal contributions to school architecture from Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Frank Lloyd Wright, Walter Gropius, Tony Garnier, Le Corbusier, Alvar Aalto, the Smithsons, Aldo van Eyck and Herman Hertzberger.
Another familiar theme weaving throughout the book is the notion of schools as micro-societies, best articulated by John Dewey’s conception of schools as cooperative communities; as embryonic community life containing scaled-down adult activities. Echoing Dewey, Margaret MacMillan, working with the urban poor in London in the early twentieth century, referred to “cities of childhood” where school was a place of many shelters, just as children create their imaginary, safe shelters out of furniture and other materials. The school becomes a township of small shelters built as one community but with each shelter organized as a separate self-contained unit or school home to meet the needs of children of specific ages.
Following this metaphor, architects have imaginatively organized the school as a microcosm of the city with classrooms as houses, corridors and communal space as streets, and assembly hall as town hall or forum of public life. Architects have typically seized the “spaces in between,” or the “un-programmed” space, as an opportunity to enhance social relationships between users, differentiating this social space to correlate with diversity of the learning experience. Today, architects specializing in educational facility planning talk regularly of neighborhoods, a recurring theme in school design.
In Chapter 2, Dudek focuses on the modern classroom from the perspective of the educator and asks what must teachers in the modern classroom do to be effective educators? What concerns might classroom teachers have with their environment, relating to the delivery of education, which school designers should understand? Dudek uses the exercise of creating the ideal classroom to engage educators in a discussion concerning the complexities of the roles of classroom teachers. In this process, he challenges teachers to be spatially aware in order to relate their experiences directly to their classroom environments.
Here once again, modern day dichotomies emerge between the proponents of child-centered and subject-centered curricula. Dudek finds that an important theme with teachers is the need for well-defined, orderly classroom environments that serve as a safe haven for young children, and that are “out of reach of adults” for older students. However, within the context of discussions on the new UK National Curriculum, Dudek notes that school designers are often asked to meet seemingly contradictory educational needs of both learning through social interaction in the classroom, and learning through the adoption of contemplative and disciplinary methods. These conflicting educational demands create competing design requirements, such as the requirement for distance and separation of activity on the one hand, and the requirement for compactness and flexibility of space on the other. He reconciles these contradictions by suggesting a “hybrid approach” to teaching that reflects a range of views as to how children learn – not simply child-centered or whole-class teacher centered, but both. He suggests striking a balance between a completely finished environment and an empty shell, best arrived at through collaboration between architect and educators.
In formally “making the case” for architecture in schools (Chapter 3), Dudek, begins by providing the familiar arguments about the use of schools as community centers and the benefits of opening them up to the community, the importance of involving the community in the planning and design of schools, and the idea of involving parents in the school through the networking of technology between the home and school environment. He provides several examples of community-based approaches to incrementally improving schools at minimal cost that actively involve children such as outdoor landscaping projects. He also discusses sensory gardens that provide therapeutic benefits for special needs students.
Another approach Dudek takes is to provide a history and unique examples of well-designed prefabricated schools that have been shown to contribute to education at lesser cost without the stigma of temporary portable buildings. He describes one of his own projects, Portakabin’s “Academy” modular prototype classroom, Lilliput Nursery, UK, that can accommodate a diverse range of activities within a single class group.
In his final chapter, Dudek expands the notion of school architecture beyond the immediate concerns of classroom teachers to other aspects of architecture that he believes can have a profound influence on teaching and learning such as natural light, sustainable design, the importance of community spaces in schools, and learning through landscapes. He dedicates the final section to the practicalities and possibilities of funding and procurement strategies in the UK system.
Has Dudek made his case for the importance of architecture in schools? His work demonstrates the difference between what might be called “good architecture” as distinguished from the more common phrase of “adequate school facilities.” The projects illustrated throughout the book go beyond the notion of adequate and strive to be motivational. There is a need for school architecture that can support and motivate students to be academically successful within a complex social environment. Dudek makes this argument very clear. Curiously, he does not take advantage of the now more than forty years of literature in educational environmental psychology that provides empirical support for many of the arguments he proposes (Barker and Gump 1964; Gump 1987; McGuffy 1982; Rivlin and Wolfe 1985; Weinstein 1979). In addition, in more than one case there is a tendency toward architectural determinism in the rhetoric of some school architects. However, Dudek certainly demonstrates that school architecture that is not overtly environmentally determinist, but rather is adaptable to the shifting, complex and often-conflicting demands of the teaching and learning processes is possible and that it is being done internationally.
References
Barker, R.G. and P.V. Gump (1964). Big School, Small School. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.
Gump, P.V. (1987). 'School and Classroom Environments.' In Stokols, D. and I. Altman, eds. Handbook of Environmental Psychology. New York: Wiley, 691-732.
McGuffy, C. (1982). 'Facilities.' In Walberg, H.J., ed. Improving Educational Standards and Productivity. Berkeley, CA: McCutchan, 237-288.
Rivlin, L.G. and M. Wolfe (1985). Institutional Settings in Children's Lives. New York: Wiley-Interscience.
Weinstein, C.S. (1979). 'The Physical Environment of the School: A Review of the Research.' Review of Educational Research 49(4): 577-610.
Reviewer Information
University of Wisconsin- Milwaukee
Jeff Lackney holds a Ph.D. and a Masters in Architecture from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee School of Architecture and Urban Planning. He is an assistant professor in the Department of Engineering Professional Development at UW-M where he conducts continuing education courses in architecture and facility management. He also holds an appointment with the Department of Interior Design in the School of Human Ecology. Additionally, he has practiced as a registered architect for 15 years- planning, designing, constructing, and evaluating educational facilities. He consults nationally as an educational facility planner advocating innovative approaches to planning for education.