The design of a studying setting instantly impacts the kind of instruction that happens in that area,
as quite a few research have demonstrated. In reality, educational design and studying area design go
hand in hand, working collectively to help scholar achievement. Simply as it’s crucial for Ok-12 leaders to
develop a strategic imaginative and prescient for what instruction ought to appear like to supply the specified studying outcomes,
it’s equally vital to create a unified imaginative and prescient round studying area design.
School rooms, frequent areas, media facilities, and different studying areas must be designed strategically to help the academic imaginative and prescient a college system has and its portrait of a graduate. The kind of furnishings, know-how, and tools utilized in these areas performs a key function in enabling the educational methods, actions, and tradition that the district is trying to promote.
Think about a college constructing full of partaking, dynamic studying environments that encourage and help all kinds of educational types and techniques, whereas additionally permitting for future evolutions in curriculum and instruction. That’s the mannequin that college techniques ought to try for. To realize this mannequin, many districts are selecting to standardize their studying environments.
Standardizing doesn’t imply adopting the identical look and format for each constructing or classroom. As an alternative, it means creating an overarching imaginative and prescient that defines the aesthetic and performance that every studying area ought to exhibit—after which growing a menu of furnishings choices that may carry this imaginative and prescient to life.
Why would a district wish to create a normal imaginative and prescient for its studying environments? Listed here are 4 core causes.
1. ACHIEVE EQUITY FOR STUDENTS AND TEACHERS
COVID shined a brilliant gentle on inequities in our colleges and society. With the teachings realized through the pandemic in thoughts, a rising variety of Ok-12 leaders are making coverage selections via a lens of fairness and inclusion.
Making a single, normal mannequin for studying area design district-wide ensures that each one college students have the identical alternatives to be taught in lecture rooms which might be totally outfitted to help the district’s imaginative and prescient for instruction—no matter who their trainer is or the place they attend college within the district. It additionally ensures that each trainer has the identical alternative to show in a classroom that’s designed with success in thoughts.
2. SUPPORT EFFECTIVE INSTRUCTION
With a longtime normal for studying area design, PK-12 leaders can make sure that each setting the place studying takes place is furnished and outfitted to help efficient, research-based instruction. In different phrases, all the pieces from the desks, tables, and chairs to the storage, shelving, and know-how has been rigorously chosen to facilitate the sorts of actions that college students and lecturers may interact in to supply the optimum studying outcomes.
If a district’s educational imaginative and prescient is to foster lively and collaborate studying, for example, the tables and chairs may be chosen with most flexibility and mobility in thoughts to allow them to simply be moved across the room and configured in numerous group sizes for collaborative group work.
3. STREAMLINE THE DESIGN AND FURNISHING OF LEARNING SPACES
With out formal tips for principals, lecturers, or curriculum administrators to observe, the classroom design and procurement course of can typically be unwieldy. Establishing a district-wide normal makes this course of a lot easier for everybody concerned.
With a proper normal in place, district-level leaders can create an internet “catalog” of furnishings and tools that matches the imaginative and prescient they’re hoping to attain. College leaders can select from this catalog to equip their studying areas in a method that maintains the character of their particular person services, whereas guaranteeing that their decisions match inside the funds and educational design framework (and funds) that the district has established.
Having an internet catalog hurries up the design and procurement course of at any time when there’s a new college development or renovation mission inside the district, whereas controlling the price of furnishings. What’s extra, standardization permits for the motion of furnishings between buildings to help beneficial properties or declines in enrollment or programming as wanted.
4. MAINTAIN HIGH QUALITY
Establishing a district-wide normal for studying area design ensures that every facility receives the identical prime quality of furnishings and tools. It permits for the management at every college to pick out the furnishings that finest meets their native wants whereas additionally sustaining consistency in order that key district requirements are at all times met: high quality, security, longevity, sustainability, worth, and—most significantly—instructional expertise.
A TRUSTED PARTNER CAN HELP
Whereas college techniques can definitely create their very own strategic imaginative and prescient for studying area design, partnering with a trusted service supplier provides the chance for skilled perception that district leaders may not have.
By means of a brand new service referred to as College Specialty® Innovate360™, we can assist districts create a personalized imaginative and prescient for studying area design that meets their distinctive wants and curate a collection of furnishings and tools that may set up a district-wide normal. To be taught extra, contact your College Specialty® Consultant.
Dr. Sue Ann Highland
Sue Ann Highland, PhD, is the Nationwide Schooling Strategist for College Specialty. She has greater than 25 years of expertise as an educator, administrator, and advisor with college techniques throughout america, with broad experience in designing and creating extremely efficient studying environments.
Learn extra by Dr. Sue Ann Highland–>
