SPACES FOR LEARNING in ART and DESIGN

More projects

2011-10-09T08:05:00.000-07:00

Following a visit to the University of Brighton from Cathrine Schmidt and Hanne Airo from the Danish Ministry of Science, who are developing a new learning spaces briefing for science spaces in universities across Denmark (more to tell you soon I hope), they kindly also put us in touch with Jonas Nordquist, the manager for a project called Future Learning Environments - How Space Impacts on Learning run by Karolinska Institutet and Stockholm County Council. See their web site at ki.se/learningspaces.

This feels like a really integrated, (relatively) large-scale project across both formal and informal learning environments, across three sites related to medical education; aiming to "develop and deliver a range of prototype environments to support new pedagogies within Karolinska Institutet s medical education programmes."

Working with White architecture practice, they have already developed a Concept Manual to act as a design guide. Interestingly this work was also supported by an ethnographic study of students responses to their environment which is - unfortunately - currently only in Swedish. The next phase is to build prototypes and then to do a comparative evaluation.

I may be wrong, but this is the first large scale, multi-space prototyping and evaluation research project that I have heard of. Of course the University of Melbourne has been developing a series of innovative learning spaces over several years; but as yet has no funds for evaluation, so the lessons for others are still difficult to learn.

Central Saint Martins move into their new home

2011-10-01T02:58:00.000-07:00

In the early days of the CETL Learning Spaces research project, we were invited to be involved in early discussions/events at the University of the Arts, London - partly instigated to enable staff to participate in thinking what kinds of learning spaces were needed for art and design in the new facility being built at Kings Cross.

Well the students and staff have just moved in and here is Jonathan Jones/Guardian's take on the space.

So, all comments welcome from actual participants in this new environment. Would be a great opportunity to do a before/after evaluation of students/staff experiences of their learning spaces - but assume that, as usual, no-one will have the time, energy or resources.....

Photo taken from Guardian website. Photograph: Frantzesco Kangaris

Building Envelopes

2011-10-01T02:50:00.000-07:00

Can't find out very much about developments on the TU Delft 'Building the Future' project - so any help here appreciated, in terms of how this work is affecting the design of the University itself. Did find their Building Envelopes work, which looks at facade design more generally. The last conference in the series was called The Future Envelope 5 - Technology Transfer and was in May 201. They have also produced a series of technical publications on facade design with IOS Press, Amsterdam in the series “Research in Architectural Engineering”. Maybe interesting to a few readers of this blog.

The difficulties of finding out about things

2011-10-01T02:36:00.000-07:00

Had an email recently from someone working on the new University of Plymouth's Space Strategy; initially this will involve a consultation exercise and series of lectures/discussions. The project - which will be carried out by a team from the Architecture Department, and has a steering group from across the university (Estates and Facilities Management, Procurement and Sustainability, Strategic Planning and Teaching and Learning; the Education Department; and the Dean of Students) - seems like a potentially great model for learning spaces development. So looking forward to keeping in touch with what they are doing.

But it also make me think how hard it is to find out what is going on at different universities and colleges, both in this country and elsewhere. There is no central place to 'catch' all the current learning spaces work going on. And because 'space' is such an amorphous word, doing an internet search throws up all sorts of - interesting yet miscellaneous - stuff. For example, Plymouth also has a SPACE project which is about inclusive assessment.... also very relevant to the subject of learning spaces, but - of course - not about re-designing the actual fabric. Similarly, Warwick has a project about 'opening up spaces' for student learning, that is, beyond the classroom setting.

And I also came across an oldish post (from December 2010) about TU Delft, about a project called Building the Future. This was/is exploring specifically architectural education with the following aims:

- simplification of Bachelor´s education;
- reinforcement of design teaching and didactics;
- harmonisation of educational structure and alignment of the Master´s tracks;
- improvements to efficiency and assessment systems;

Which raises the related question (regularly explored on this blog) - where does learning spaces design begin and end? These kind of critical 're-locations' of what happens where and how in post-compulsory education also seem very important - particularly in the current climate, where universities and colleges are having to concentrate on how to make savings. There are also major policy changes in the air in the UK that could offer opportunities to change the whole shape of post-compulsory education in quite critical and creative ways.

Image from University of Plymouth's Architecture Department website

Finland conference

2011-09-13T02:01:00.000-07:00

Like the way the 7th annual Designs on E-learning 2011 conference, at the Aalto University in Helsinki (27 - 30 September 2011) thinks about learning space, in what feels like a very open-minded way:

"The notion of space regains fresh momentum every time we interact with the world around us. As mobile devices weave into the fabric of everyday life, we are no longer confined to a specific location, time and place in accessing and interacting with communications technologies. Interfaces become more adaptable and fluid according to the user’s needs; capable of switching seamlessly between augmented, real and virtual information and communication techniques and practices.  The conference will be exploring future learning spaces, from four different perspectives, each led by an expert innovator: Michel Bauwens will visualise networked spaces. Ben Betts will envisage social spaces for dialog and debate. Stephanie Rothenberg will be exploring open experimental spaces. Mauri Ylä-Kotola will analyse institutional spaces."

For more details, go their website. Also well worth going to the associated blog, where there are many interesting posts about how to re-think e-learning creatively.

Anne Taylor - 'Linking Architecture and Education'

2011-05-06T06:00:00.000-07:00

Anne's book is aimed at architects and brings together issues around the developmental needs of learners with ideas of seeing educational buildings as '3-dimensional textbooks.' You can read more about here approach here.

At the Wolfsonian

2011-05-06T05:55:00.000-07:00

Having an amazing time at the Wolfsonian Museum, Miami Beach which is a design museum and part of Florida International University (FIU). Been invited to give a talk on learning spaces, together with Anne Taylor, who is director of the Institute for Environmental Education at the University of New Mexico.

The collection here is that extraordinary combination you get with a private collector - important everyday artefacts from America and across Europe (mainly from the 1880s - 1940s), together with much which can only be called 'miscellaneous'. We have been talking a lot about how collections like this can support both conventional scholarly study and other kinds of creative activities, through the unexpected juxtapositions they enable. This, of course, raises tensions around accessibility, curation and conservation - similar to the ones that CETLD researchers found on projects like Behind the Scenes at the Victoria and Albert Museum. The Wolfsonian is planning some new educational spaces and already discussing just what kinds of access and what kinds of learning can be best supported here.

A quick promo

2011-03-22T11:38:00.000-07:00

A reminder that the next reLIVE conference has currently got a call out for papers. It is called Creative Solutions for New Futures and is being held at the Open University, Milton Keynes from 21^st – 22^nd September 2011. As they write:

"Innovation in teaching and learning through virtual worlds was a major theme of ReLIVE08, the first conference to bring together researchers and educators in this field. In the three years since this event, our understanding of what it means to work, play and learn in these spaces has increased significantly, generating a rapidly growing body of academic knowledge. Whilst virtual worlds are providing us with platforms for innovation, and new opportunities to understand and address the needs of learners in the 21^st century, we are under more pressure than ever not only to continue demonstrating innovation, but to do this at scale, for less money, whilst increasing efficiency and productivity. The challenge for us all is to contribute to a future where innovations meet these requirements whilst keeping learners, and learning, at the core of all that we do.

With a nod to recycling we have therefore decided that ReLIVE11 will revisit some of the themes of ReLIVE08, but from the fresh perspective of using all that we have learned in between to explore how virtual worlds can help us and our learners to find creative solutions for new futures."

Which reminded me that I recently came across this website listing '100 educational virtual tours' - not virtual learning environments per se, but still an amazing educational resource. (I got there because I found myself avidly watching a realtime train journey on the Trans-Siberian railway...)

Education for the public good?

2011-03-22T11:21:00.000-07:00

Another key theme that came out of the Reshaping Learning anthology, has been that thinking about learning spaces actually demands engaging with the whole 'shape' of education. At the post-compulsory level this is first about re-thinking what, where and how we learn, teach and research. Second it is about how space (conceptual, physical, virtual, social, personal) matters in these processes. And, third, it is about generating creative and critical networks beyond the university so as to interact with other ideas and types of adult education, such as museums and other forms of public culture.

Many of the contributors to this book start from a position that higher education is under threat from pressures towards an over-riding emphasis on employability. And they look to re-valuing education as an important public service.

I noticed that the upcoming American Educational Research Association (AERA) annual meeting in New Orleans is called "Inciting the Social Imagination: Education Research for the Public Good." As Kris D. Gutiérrez and Joanne Larson write: "We are in the midst of a vibrant and troubling education paradox. On the one hand, it is a time of remarkable interest in education, with increased attention to reform policies, unprecedented educational legislation, and money from all sectors devoted to these efforts. In public discourse, education remains foundational to opening up a range of opportunities: to achieve social and economic mobility, to gain and secure employment, and to develop future life skills. Politicians refer to the knowledge society, economists write about the new economy, and the proliferation of innovative technologies demands new forms of learning in an unparalleled knowledge economy. Yet the path or shape that these efforts take is toward technocratic and market-driven solutions to the everyday issues schools, teachers, and students experience."

The conference will therefore explore how educational research might help deal with these challenges, particularly in enabling us to better re-imagine what an education for the public good might look like.

So ... I typed 'education for the public good' into Google and found a whole lot of stuff.....

The image here is of the Checkland Building, Falmer Campus, University of Brighton and is taken from a webpage advertising an upcoming pubic debate at the University entitled The future of university education? to be held on Saturday 30th April 2011.

Where is the theory?

2011-03-21T15:35:00.000-07:00

Have been working (with my colleague Anne Boddington) on editing a collection of research papers about learning spaces, this time bringing together educationalists with designers and estate managers, and also others from areas like anthropology, computer science and museum education.

What has been interesting is how all the contributors are looking for ways - theoretically and methodologically - that do not reduce the incredible complexity of thinking about learning and space; and at the same time offer the potential for saying something rigorous and useful, which can take debates forward.

This is very exciting for me, that so many people are addressing questions of theory and practice simultaneously, and from a broad range of perspectives. Some overlapping influences are Henri Lefebrve's The Production of Space, Bruno Latour's Actor-Network Theory and Etienne Wenger's Communities of Practice work. Of course, what is also interesting is what different disciplines take from these authors, and the range of conclusions the various contributors have drawn.

The forthcoming book is called Reshaping Learning: A Critical Reader. The future of learning spaces in post-compulsory education and will be published by Sense in July this year. Contributors include Ronald Barnett, Paul Temple, Maggi Savin-Baden and Etienne Wenger.

NOW AVAILABLE FROM SENSE PUBLISHERS - CLICK HERE!

It's out!

2010-11-27T06:41:00.000-08:00

The book I have been writing - Towards Creative Learning Spaces - is out this week, published by Routledge. Available on Amazon.

Looking forward (anxiously) to comments......

Re-shaping Learning - the conference (and the book)

2010-11-27T06:36:00.000-08:00

The Re-Shaping Learning conference at the University of Brighton in July 2010 aimed to bring together the best researchers around Learning Spaces - who are usually separated because they work across the different disciplines of educational theory, design teaching, architecture and estates management. One of the things we have been interested in is how to make the best work more easily accessible (since it is scattered across many subjects and locations). So it is great news that Sense want to publish a book collection for us.

The conference was also one of the last events of CETLD, at the end of its five year life, and - as with the other CETLs - it is only now that some crucial emerging themes are becoming clear. A key concern of the conference was to widen debate about Learning Spaces beyond building some new innovative informal learning spaces. Many contributors agreed that it also urgently needs to include theoretical research and development, cross-disciplinary critical debate, improved methodologies for designing and evaluating spaces and a much more focussed engagement with the 'big' issues of learning as a social and spatial practice; that is, both unravelling the assumptions about where, how, why and for whom different forms of education are patterned in space and time, and how these might be better organised.

Design and Management of Learning Spaces conference

2010-07-26T13:45:00.000-07:00

This one day conference in mid-June was sub-titled Changing Minds and offered an interestingly eclectic set of speakers across architecture, education and estates.

The person who stood out for me though was Simon Austin from Loughborough, one of the partners in the recent HEFCE -funded project on Academic Workspace. As he summarises:

"Many universities have tried to create new types of academic office environments that foster collaboration and knowledge flow between occupants, in a bid to increase creativity and innovation in teaching and research. However, core aspects of academic work also require privacy and opportunity for quiet reflection. A common strategy to address this tension is the provision of multiple work settings, which provide occupants with a mixture of private and social/shared environments. This presentation introduces the concept of default location and, with reference to two in-depth case studies, argues that this plays a critical role in the success of multi-setting office environments."

So, through rigorous comparative study, the research was able to show real qualitative differences in the experiences of academic staff/usability of space between having private offices with a shared area; and sharing an open-plan office with bookable 'seminar/private' spaces off. Most importantly this was not just a matter of functionality; it was how they felt they might be perceived by others if 'took up' space in particular ways.

Just great to see a well evidenced study, with clear and usable outcomes.

The 'shape' of online learning resources

2010-05-16T06:54:00.000-07:00

I have been thinking a bit lately about how online learning resources are changing - in terms of what and how these are provided. Some time ago, I explored 'distributed creativity' , that is, websites that are increasingly blurring boundaries between teaching and learning, and quite often shift easily backwards and forwards across virtual and material spaces (see sidebar for a list - other suggestions always welcome).

Now, I keep finding examples which are offering more specialist learning resources, centred around not just materials but also tools, networking and other services. The Urban Design London Learning Space , for example, offers "a basic introduction to the theories, tricks and tools you can use to help create well-designed places.

We'll explain the words we can use to define the qualities of well-designed places
We'll describe processes and tools you can use to achieve good design
We'll talk about the theories and policies you can use to deliver good design
We'll help you learn by using pictures, stories, examples and activities"

which you can also develop through face-to-face courses. I have also been asked to be participate in a series of parallel workshops across over 70 universities globally, organised by Madrid Design Net. This is part of plans to develop new ideas for the urban development of Madrid, by both importing and exporting suggestions from other cities. It is based on a set of themes, a designed 'kit' and a structured workshop programme, supported by a website for sharing possibilities worldwide.

These kinds of resources suggest an increasing maturity in well-thought out and managed materials and activities online. Both are much more than either putting lecture notes on the web, or just 'sharing' through a blog/social network. They are serious and well-designed resources. Interestingly, in both cases the developments don't come from a university setting alone, but from a partnership with (and sponsorship from) other private and public organisations.

What really matters, though, is to see if they can get over the problem - particularly in post-compulsory education - of take-up; that is, will such resources and tools actually get used by a big enough constituency to make the amount of development work worth while?

A different kind of learning space

2010-04-27T07:14:00.000-07:00

Met Jan Sellers at the Learning Landscapes conference: she is a National Teaching Fellow and her project is exploring labyrinths as a teaching tool. As she says:

"She began to explore the need for quietness, and time and space for reflection. She was aware of an increasing sense of stress, pressure and haste amongst students in their academic lives, and to some extent, a loss of joy in learning. (...)

The labyrinth works at a number of different levels. At its simplest the labyrinth provides a quiet, peaceful walk: a structured opportunity for reflection. The narrow path requires concentration to follow, thus offering a focus on the present; this may result in an experience akin to a walking meditation."

This led to the installation of the Canterbury Labyrinth at the University of Kent in 2008, as part of the Creative Campus Initiative (CCI). A team of facilitators at Kent are now working with this and other, temporary and portable, labyrinths, leading events including team-building, confidence building and workshops to foster creativity and deepen reflection within and across academic disciplines.

For more information, click here.

Image shows Canterbury Labyrinth in Winter: photograph by Jim Higham, University of Kent

The problem with names

2010-04-25T04:39:00.000-07:00

The Learning Landscapes conference has been written up in the Times Higher Ed by Matthew Reisz, under the title "

"Lingua franca needed to shape cutting-edge pedagogic spaces".

What is most perhaps most interesting is the (one) response to date, which I will quote in full:

"Lingua franca needed? We could do with a little more plain English too. Pedagogic spaces indeed! And what on earth does "ways in which the academic voice can be fully articulated within the decision-making processes at all levels of the design and development of teaching and learning spaces" mean?"

So whilst Mike Neary, the co-ordinator of the project, is calling for more academic involvement in, and reflection on, learning space design - especially through deeper engagements with the idea of the university - here is an academic who doesn't even know what he is talking about. I have also interviewed many tutors who didn't think the concept of learning spaces means much that is useful or interesting to them.

This isn't to say that academics are the problem. Rather it raises three issues. First, both educational theory and architectural design still have little purchase on many post-compulsory academic disciplines; theory because it seems obscure and unrelated to the specialist expertise of different subjects, and architecture because outside of art and design it tends to be treated as something which is obvious, but which architects somehow fail to get 'right'. Second, there is no such thing as a shared language about learning spaces - what we urgently need to do instead is improve our understandings of the relationships between space and its occupation; and to open these up for wider debate. Third, we have to start from where academics and their colleagues are, that is, by accepting the tensions and complexities of existing communities of practice within and across universities and colleges, and not expecting consensus or even acceptance that here is an area worth considering. And to do that we need to make better arguments....

Talking spaces

2010-04-21T05:42:00.000-07:00

Just back from the Learning Landscapes conference at Queen Mary's College London, which was to launch their final HEFCE-funded report and tools. I gave a paper (called "where is the theory?") and also listened to an interesting and varied range of other speakers. Very full day - 10 speakers in total - so not much audience participation possible, but good in that the speakers were selected to open up debate, rather than merely describe the project report.

Left with a mixture of optimism about the vital potential of bringing together estate managers, architects and educationalists perspectives on learning spaces; and frustrated that we still have - despite the work of the groups like Learning Landscapes at the University of Lincoln - very few approaches or methods which offer a firm purchase on relationships between architectural design, teaching and learning encounters, and space/resource development and management. Or rather we have several, but which are being generated piecemeal across the sector, from across both academic and commercial locations.

So we are left to choose between - if we can even find the work - say, the LL approach based on a better understanding of the history of universities as a building type, or (from the Institute of Education in London) Paul Temple's ideas about thinking 'place' rather than 'space'; or even my own argument which is that we need to build better conceptual frameworks and research methods, preferrably on the best contemporary theoretical work across architecture, education and the social sciences.... the core argument behind the Towards Creative Learning Spaces book.

Picture this!

2010-03-17T08:02:00.000-07:00

Getting close to my deadline for handing the manuscript of Towards Creative Learning Spaces: re-thinking the architecture of post-compulsory education into Routledge, the publishers, which is exciting and terrifying at the same time!

One of the interesting but difficult things has been thinking about illustrations. There are already many well-known examples of good practice out there - particularly represented by shifts towards informal learning and more hybrid research spaces respectively - across the UK, US and Australia. But these examples tend not to overlap much with the kinds of building designs for post-compulsory learning spaces which architects and architectural students look at. And what about closely related building types like new forms of creative offices and educational spaces in museums and galleries?

There is no way I can be comprehensive with a relatively small number of (B&W) images. So my intention is to go for less well known spaces, but which illustrate some of the key issues and questions. Which could upset both learning spaces design specialists when their good work is not included and architects/students looking for pretty pictures. Ahh well....

Where do we look for good examples?

2010-01-05T04:08:00.000-08:00

One of the important aspects of the recent CETLD-hosted Learning Spaces Special Interest Group (SIG) was the way it brought together people across education, and between educationalists from universities and from other institutions. So in addition to learning development people, there were also librarians and computing specialists; and as well as representatives from Brighton, Sheffield, Sheffield-Hallam, Sussex, Nottingham, Cardiff and Coventry universities there were also participants from the V& A and Writtle College.

As well as visits to both CETLD and InQbate, part of the CETL-C initiative, the group explored examples they had each been asked to bring of good learning spaces they knew; in terms of what was effective, was what challenging and issues around evaluation.

As well as some of the more well-known innovative learning spaces recently built in unversities, types of spaces discussed included some from elsewhere:

· Outdoor formal garden space, Devon - good for formal, informal, complex, varied, surprising and aspiration reasons; challenges for weather, intrusions

· Herman Miller National Design Centre, London. Multi-functional modular open space. Good for flexible, adaptable, “aspirational”, interesting use of partitions; challenges – noisy, flexible, adaptable, jack of all trades etc. and noisy

· National Art library, V&A museum, good for quiet, peaceful space, old desks, beautiful view, challenges can include high noise at times

I have also recently been looking at the various Google offices again, and thinking two - potentially contradictory - thoughts. First, that we need to look at these too (and the whole impact of ideas of the 'knowledge economy' on office design. And second, that we need to know more about what is distinctive about spaces for post-compulsory learning, so that we can really understand what kinds of changes (whether physical or virtual) can enhance learning at this level.

Image shows facade of Herman Miller National Design Centre, recently opened in the Aldwych in London.

Engaging with theory

2009-12-12T01:30:00.000-08:00

I have recently been re-reading Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger's very influential book Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation (1991) and exploring both the huge impact around, and various critiques of, Wenger's work since on communities of practice.

Without doubt, the concept of communities of practice has a real resonance to our understanding of how learning happens. Wenger and his colleagues have moved beyond learning focused at the level of the teacher-learner and articulated it instead as a wider - and crucially social - process.

In the context of learning spaces though, one of the most interesting aspects is Wenger's idea of repertoire - that is, the way that particular objects, spaces and procedures which 'define' a specific community of practice. As he says, this is “the process of giving form to our experience by producing objects that congeal that experience into ‘thingness’. In so doing, we create points of focus around which the negotiation of meaning becomes organised (…) any community of this kind produces abstractions, tools, symbols, stories, terms and concepts that reify something of that practice in a congealed form.” (Wenger 1998:58-59)

Wenger is most interested in this as a means of stabilisation, where objects, spaces and procedures become unthought about 'reifications', helping to embed and normalise a community of practice. But if we are exploring what might make better learning spaces, then both the communities of practice of post-compulsory learning and different subject disciplines compulsory education have to be problematicised. Here, then, we can begin to think about learning spaces as an area of contested repertoires. Which has all sorts of potential for thinking about both conceptual frameworks and research methods.

Image: photograph by ex-RCA group Jan Family

Places to study?

2009-10-24T01:55:00.000-07:00

As part of my Russian trip, I went on a visit of the Moscow State University - built in the 1950s by Stalin (as one of his infamous Gothic skyscrapers) - which was designed as a self-contained campus with accommodation for 6, 000 students, on Sparrow Hills just to the south of the Moskva river.

I was taken around by students who were well aware of the building's history (it was built by prisoners), but also felt the importance of both remembering and continuing its ethos of good academic education. They showed us these original desks - still in use throughout and facing a traditional chalk blackborad - and said how much they were motivated by sitting where previous generations of scholars had learnt.

For some reason this reminded me of a recent summary of learning spaces at Cambridge University, written as part of the Learning Landscape project, funded by the Higher Education Academy. The learning experience at somewhere like Cambridge is just so different to, for example, one of the ex-polytechnics; both because of the postive echoes of its academic history and because of the range and type of spaces available across both accommodation (the Colleges) and university departments.

As author Dr. Catherine Howell writes, "Colleges are important to students because they provide a spectrum of critical study resources - including study space - within easy reach, and because they are learning and social communities. These communities are especially valued by undergraduate students in view of the study workload, the high-stakes assessment system and the relatively short Cambridge terms, all of which contribute to the '24-hour' work culture." (Howell 2008:4). For nme, this is yet another warning against the glib generalities of 'formal' versus 'informal' learning spaces.

2009-10-13T06:09:00.000-07:00

As the two main CETLD learning spaces researchers, Hilary and I have been talking a lot recently about what is already available, in terms of appropriate conceptual frameworks, research methods and taxonomies. Hilary has been reviewing the many good practice case studies of contemporary learning spaces in post-compulsory education. There are lots of interesting examples but also some on-going problems: potential citation distortion (where the same examples are referenced again and again without much checking on the validity of the data proffered); difficulties of finding out what is happening across the sector, intersecting with varying degrees of promotion by individual universities and projects; and – because of the recent focus on technology-rich and informal learning spaces – a tendency to ignore (or fail to effectively classify/compare and contrast) the range of developments taking place across the variety of learning spaces from lecture theatres, to labs, to studios to research centres.

In the latter area, for example, Woods Bagot have done an interesting ‘study tour’ of advanced learning institutes, aimed at bringing together researchers from different disciplines; of which the MIT Stata Center (pictured above), designed by Frank Gehry Associates, is probably one of the most famous/infamous.

These are very relevant to CETLD because it brings together HE institutions with non-university partners. Who, for example, is analysing and comparing museum education spaces with HE versions? Well, us I hope!

Towards a working definition of learning spaces?

2009-10-12T05:29:00.000-07:00

When I started research into learning spaces in post-compulsory education I found little not framed by the 'commonsense' notion that we should be moving from formal (passive, boring) to informal (active, exciting) spaces in both physical design and teaching and learning methods.

Just how changes in spaces and changes in learning were connected remain under-explored; as do the complexities of why and how to implement any effective improvements.

More recently, with some serious attempts to re-think evaluation methods for example, it feels like we are beginning to see the need for both better theory and practices. So it was great to read - for the first time in my experience - a researcher examining what might make a working definition of the concept learning spaces (in her case using the term 'learning landscapes'). I don't know if I agree with Angela Thody (researcher for the University of Lincoln's Learning Landscapes project) attempt, but it offers a very useful start to help thinking and debate:

University learning landscapes are conceptually holistic, loosely-coupled interconnections of all formal and informal, on- and off-campus, virtual and physical facilities, sites and services and how stakeholders use them. A learning landscapes approach is distinguished from mere site management by academics’ and governors’ conscious decisions to manipulate all the traditional and innovative facilities so they are continually and ubiquitously available, collaborative opportunities to enhance learning. Preparations for this approach require understandings of why universities are still wanted, mapping of how they are now used and a belief that all elements of university environments have to justify their roles in learning. (Thody 2008(1):13)

And the image is from architect Sarah Wigglesworth, who is one of many contemporary architects very interested in finding ways of working with architectural space as a process - inseparable from the activities that go on in it.

The formal large lecture problem

2009-10-10T06:44:00.000-07:00

Have recently been re-reading a research paper by Boyle and Nicol from the Centre for Academic Practice, University of Strathclyde, on using electronic ‘classroom communication systems’ (CCS) to improve teaching and learning for large, lecture-based groups. What Boyle and Nicol point out is that - whatever the preference for small-group, informal and interactive learning – the reality is of larger student cohorts and fewer staff. In that context, where the large lecture is not going to go away, they suggest that a CCS can improve the quality of learning.

If you have used such a system, you will know that it is basically enables participants in a large lecture setting to respond to a multiple choice question via an electronic handheld device, with total results then immediately displayed to the whole class as some form of bar chart. The experience is an odd one, since it feels a bit like being in some sort of TV quiz show, but the effects can be powerful. Boyle and Nicol evaluated the introduction of CCS into mechanical engineering courses at Strathclyde, aimed at dealing with lecturers problems with mass-lecturing; described as “weak conceptual understanding, insufficient interaction and discussion and low levels of motivation.” (p.2)

Via a couple of variations - one based on peer and the other class-wide discussion – lectures were re-framed to ask key concept questions, with students first providing their individual responses via the CCS and then discussing both their own understanding and the whole group feedback with each other. Overall the students were strongly supportive that such techniques improved their understanding, interaction and motivation compared to traditional lectures. Teachers were able to quickly gauge how well the class understood concepts under discussion, and had a mechanism whereby students could compare their own progress to the overall distribution, which - together with group discussion - helped more students to ‘get’ the key concepts.

There are two points to add here. First, as Boyle and Nicol discuss, the bigger issue becomes less about the technology and much more about the design of the teaching and learning process. Lecture writing becomes must more a matter of developing a sequence of test construction, and the management of student interaction. So, again, we need to make more explicit and have ways of debating underlying pedagogic practices.

The second point is that such a study underlines the complexity of thinking about the design of learning spaces. This technology at least partially shifts the relationships between (presumed active) teacher and (presumed passive) students in a lecture theatre setting, without the space having to change at all. Or rather, it is the conceptual/social space which is changed in this case, not the physical one.

Adult learning beyond the campus

2009-09-20T05:32:00.000-07:00

In response to its Learning Revolution white paper, the Government has a £20m Transformation Fund to support informal adult learning - learning for pleasure, self-development and community development - which has been awarding money to a wide range of projects "all with the objective of seeing creative learning flourish across the country." These funds are enabling collaborations between museums, galleries, universities and colleges to offer particular schemes for adult learners. The emphasis, I guess, wil be on social empowerment and cohesion, which is already central to how museums (but not so much universities) think about their role.

In fact have recently been re-visiting the Museum, Libraries and Archives (MLA) Inspired Learning for All website, which lists the various learning frameworks put together by different quangos for schools and adult education; why do I feel that these groups - rightly or wrongly - are much more willing to give explicit definitions of what learning is than any university academic...

Image of Turner Contemporary, designed by David Chipperfield Associates and currently under construction in Margate, which has won one of the transformation awards for a project bringing old and young people together under the title Teenage

Never enough space!

2009-09-19T23:27:00.000-07:00

As another academic year begins, I am aware yet again of that tension between feeling there is simply not enough space - particularly in studios where we still still wish for a model of one desk per student where they can work whenever they want - and knowing that in programming and occupancy terms, our buildings will feel relatively empty; that actual occupancy rates will be low compared to, say, offices.

And I still feel we should be able to design our way out of this problem, just can't work out how!

Helpfully, the University of Lincoln's Centre for Educational Research and Development is running a research project (in collaboration with DEGW) called Learning Landscapes "looking at the ways in which academics work with colleagues in Estates to develop and manage innovation in the design of teaching and learning spaces in Higher Education."

Experiencing formal learning

2009-09-19T23:12:00.000-07:00

Recently had the opportunity to visit art and architecture courses at the Academy of Architecture in Moscow. It puts the debates about a formal -to- informal learning in the UK and elsewhere into a certain sort of perspective. Both architectural and art students still spend a considerable amount of their early training copying classical examples (busts, sculptures, columns and entablatures) through measured drawings, meticulously drawn and then shadowed in ink and wash; usually several months for one drawing.

We haven't done this in the UK since the 1960s, so it feels very dated. But it also makes one think about why the Russians still do it, and we don't - and what the impacts are on the students learning.

Finding good examples of learning spaces

2009-08-25T01:11:00.000-07:00

Now we have a new Learning Spaces researcher at CETLD - Hilary Smith - we are beginning a piece of work planned for some time; a critical revisit of the most frequently cited 'best practice' UK Learning Spaces case studies. Not surprisingly, the same examples come up again and again in JISC and other reports so we felt it was time to take an overview and explore the underlying intentions, assumptions and evaluation methodologies of these studies. Our aim is to develop richer and more rigorous methods for assessing 'success'; and then test these on some other learning spaces (including more 'traditional' lecture theatres etc.)

Luckily, it looks like the JELS study (see previous post) by LSRI, University of Nottingham has also undertaken such a taxonomy, although it is not in the public domain yet. I have the feeling that this is something that lots of people involved in Learning Spaces are thinking of doing.....

Image by Jos Boys; disabled and deaf artist workshop on 'a space for two people to meet' at InQbate, CETL-C, Summer 2008. Artwork by Mandy Legg and Sabine Gruhn

More on evaluation

2009-08-17T04:38:00.000-07:00

The final JISC report “Study of effective evaluation models & practices for technology supported physical learning spaces” has now been published, can be accessed here. Undertaken by the LSRI at the University of Nottingham, the research found that existing evaluations were not, to put it politely, much to write home about:

Our initial investigations showed that although institutions were keen to advertise new or innovative learning spaces, the practice of evaluating such spaces was not made readily visible and was thus harder to identify or track. A key finding to emerge from the study was that if evaluations were undertaken they occurred as part of an internal institutional process, typically prompted as part of a student satisfaction survey, of which the outputs were not ordinarily deemed to be for external consumption. This has limited the extent to which knowledge sharing about learning spaces has been promoted across the whole educational community.

The study suggests that HE and FE need to think harder about how to evaluate physical learning spaces, so as to more clearly assess how they satisfy design intentions and teaching and learning needs. They also propose a conceptual Framework for Evaluating Learning Spaces (FELS), aiming to offer a common vocabulary for evaluation which different institutions could test. And they have started a Learning Spaces social networking site at spacesforlearning.ning.com .

Image from student project Minimum Conditions for Creativity LondonMet University

Affordances

2009-08-17T03:15:00.000-07:00

I have been doing some reading up on the concept of 'affordances' recently. Because my background is from architecture not technology, I have rather missed out on developments in human-computer interactions. An affordance is a quality of an object, or an environment, that allows an individual to perform an action. At its basic level, the aim is that the object and the ‘afforded’ action match. But in addition, the affordances of an object or space can refer to all the action possibilities that are feasible. Some authors, would limit this to the possibilities of which the individual performing the action is aware, or can easily discover. People like Donald Norman in his books, The Design of Everyday Things and The Design of Future Things have both popularised and developed this work.

What is powerful about these kinds of approaches, is that they engage at an intimate level of detail in the interactions between people, things and spaces. (Go to Dan Lockton's website Design with Intent to see some great examples.) The problem, though, is at the conceptual level: around the slippage as to whether affordances are inherent in an object or place - part of its 'nature' - or only exist through cultural conventions and processes of human interpretation.

Architecture has the same problem. Does form and space 'tell' us how to behave, or do we apply 'readings' based on our own personalities, preferences and cultures? Norman tries to separate out the realities of physical constraints/inherent properties which will affect affordances from cultural conventions, that is where there is nothing inherent in devices or design to afford a particular action, and we could try and do the same with Learning Spaces. But, for me, the underlying problem remains; this is a behavioural view where people and things relate through a kind of stimuli-response mechanism. Occupation is much more an interactive encounter than this, where we both change, and are changed by our activities. Space doesn't 'make' us do anything, but nor is it without effect.

Image from www.ingridhora.com

Space and sustainability

2009-07-27T08:28:00.000-07:00

Last week the government unveiled their plans to reduce greenhouse admissions in the UK by 34%. Universities are already looking at how to reduce carbon and how to embed sustainability across what they do: in the curriculum, in estates planning and management and through related activities (for example, the University of Brighton recently won funding for as part of the edible campus network). This is not just altruism - the government has also said that from 2011, some of the funding that institutions receive will be linked to how well they reduce carbon emissions.

So, sustainability is becoming increasing interlocked with learning spaces. As the Guardian reported recently (Let's have a heated debate July 21 2009), this is not just about the physical issues of building and energy costs - although these are crucially important - but also about the next generation of students. The article quotes Iain Patton, executive director of Environmental Association for Universities and Colleges, saying " No matter how large a university carbon footprint is, it is nothing compared to the impact of its graduates when they leave and enter homes and workplaces. If we miss this, we really do miss the larger picture. When at university, we have the responsibility to ensure learners are exposed to knowledge and values which they can take on with them as informed, responsible citizens. Every aspect of our campuses, buildings, teaching and leadership must be oriented to achieve this."

Image: Agnes Denes, Wheatfield – A Confrontation, 1982. Two acres of wheat planted and harvested in Battery Park Landfill, downtown Manhattan. Commissioned by Public Art Fund, New York City. Photo: Agnes Denes - currently on show as part of Radical Nature exhibition, Barbican, London.

When augmenting reality becomes a cinch

2009-07-21T10:52:00.000-07:00

With the potential of the latest iPhone to use applications which can tell you where you are and where others (or other things) are through GPS and a built in digital compass; and which can also be manipulated through touch on and movement of the device itself, we suddenly have a interactive, personal instrument which is both sensuously tactile and spatially oriented.

Already designers are exploring applications (apps) which exploit these qualities. Meanwhile, over in the US at the MIT MediaLab, there have been people working on augmented reality projects for years. As they say, "The Fluid Interfaces research group is radically rethinking the ways we interact with digital information and services. We design interfaces that are more intuitive and intelligent, and better integrated in our daily physical lives. We investigate ways to augment the everyday objects and spaces around us, making them responsive to our attention and actions. The resulting augmented environments offer opportunities for learning and interaction and ultimately for enriching our lives." And then, of course, there are those very smart people at the University of East London, SMARTlab.

I am a bit embarrassed at how excited this makes me - and all my friends know I am a gizmo addict - but this is a big one. Finally technology has a material feel and spatial/sensuous capabilities. The possibilities for art and design education are there just waiting to be explored...

Engage with Engage!

2009-07-21T10:07:00.000-07:00

Had a fantastic time last week at the Engage International Summer School in Kilkenny (with a trip to Dublin thrown in), entitled Shifting Perspectives - positioning learning at the centre of the gallery. Engage is a membership organisation representing gallery, art and education professionals in the UK and worldwide. Gallery educators, curators and artists explored both where 'learning' sits within the wide range of institutional step-ups represented; and what learning means or should mean in a gallery/museums/collections/archives situation.

It was very stimulating for me to be working and talking with people who share many concerns but must also engage different audiences and have other sorts of cultural baggage and a very different history around, and context for, their various ideas, attitudes and practices. It throws a kind of useful questioning look at the assumptions we have in art and design in higher education. The amount of energy discussing the problems and sucesses of a variety of institutional frameworks was also insightful - something again that seems to me to be less explicitly considered in the university sector.

Image shows workshop underway in Kilkenny Castle photo: Jos Boys

The qualities of good learning spaces

2009-07-21T05:12:00.000-07:00

At the UAL Making Spaces event, I ran a workshop asking the question I have been asking a lot of people: what makes a good learning space? Groups were asked first to discuss their own experiences of 'good' and 'bad' learning spaces and then to come up with a short list of key 'good' characteristics. Again, there was a lot of emphasis on the whole experience of learning, not just its physical spaces. For example - well-orchestrated/good choreography/managing expectations/explicit rules of the game. Or safe enough to take risks/confidence giving/non-precious/belonging. Or spirit of discovery/dynamic/valued. Others focused on basics - fit for purpose/environmental comfort/functional/inviting/organised (not left with previous activities 'mess'). And colour/variety (avoid ubiquity)/daylight/good acoustics/airflow/proper equipment/good catering.

Interestingly, a lot of the follow-up discussion was less about 'high-quality' designed facilites and more about how to improve the feel of existing spaces - about 'ownership' (who, how) and the power of students being able to appropriate space; about the importance of space feeling valued rather than neglected; about what types of spaces might sit between open access/flexible and dedicated/single use; and about how spaces might be 'refreshed' so they do not become too familiar, but retain the potential of engagement/unexpected outcomes.

A creative tension?

2009-07-09T03:14:00.000-07:00

One of the comments at the end of UAL's Making Space conference concerned an 'elephant in the room' - the tensions between the desires and needs of art and design tutors/students and the realities of costs and scarce resources.

This tension reveals itself in many ways; in the tendency for estates managers and academics to distrust each other; in the perpetual gap between perceptions that there is never enough space (tutors) and that - at around 20- 25% - occupancy rates are too low (estates); in the problems of rooms being booked and then not used; and in arguments over dedicated spaces for courses, or one-studio space-per-student, or the amount and type of academic offices.

I joined a very interesting workshop run by Sian Kilner, who has been centrally involved in the new Space Management Group (SMG) guidance on planning affordable - and sustainable educational buildings. She has been exploring methods beyond simple space-per-student norms which aim instead to make more transparent and open for debate the intersecting effects of types of space, timetabling, activities and student numbers on costs.

We ended up having a discussion about problems of averages and peakloads. For me, educational courses are more like the bus system than a standard office - there are inherently peaks and troughs through the semester cycle, particularly in the art and design subjects. Another delegate said we have to think about studio space as a service, as something that needs to be offered even if it is not used all the time. (This is much better explained by Han herself on her blog http://evocativethings.blogspot.com/.) I came away thinking that if art and design tutors want to argue their case better, we have to look at methods for space planning which are more complex (that is, can better model the patterns through the academic cycle), but of course not so complex that they are ineffective predictors; and we have to be able to describe more precisely the space/time patterns of learning in art and design in HE to estates and facilities managers.

Image from installation in courtyard, Chelsea College of Art and Design, UAL. Millbank, London

Learning through appropriating space?

2009-07-08T06:37:00.000-07:00

Was at the second University of the Arts London conference yesterday. Called Making Space a lot of the presentations and discussions this time around were about the creative potential of found or 'non-spaces' for art and design education. Rather than the "whatever we do, lets make it flexible" approach or the corporate/office feel of the bland building-with-an-atrium, many speakers hankered after the special pleasures of appropriating existing spaces and the learning potential in creatively occupying and/or transforming them. Here, the model was more the city (Sunand Prasad - "The city before us is a fantastic teacher; its functions call out for appropriate form and for us to appropriate it"; David Porter - "The studio is a city in miniature."). Ben Evans talked about 'pop-up' spaces and site-specific work, the creativity engendered by such temporary engagements.

There was a real feeling of a shift (maybe because of a strong architectural presence) towards trying to make learning spaces which can release the best energies of their occupants - something just focusing on functional quality can sometimes negate. This doesn't mean we can get away from the importance (particularly in art and design subjects) of spaces with certain technical specifications, only that the alternative should not be merely undifferentiated 'flexible' space.

Image of Catherine Yass project High Wire (2008) http://www.artangel.org.uk/projects/2008/high_wire

What is the difference between an office and an educational building?

2009-06-22T10:15:00.000-07:00

Just back from a very brief trip to Belfast, where I was taken around the new(ish) Faculty of Art and Design building at the University of Ulster. Here is another project with a very clear underlying diagram (see previous comments on Telford College, Edinburgh). It is a series of open floor planes around two atria, like a huge number 8. At first glance it seems to be based on the layout and language of a shared coporate office space, with cafes and display space on the ground floor and then a variety of sizes of glazed-in an open 'boxes' above, providing offices, seminar and studio spaces.

But the difference lies in how the spaces are connected. There are many varieties of relationship, mostly emphasising openness. So staff offices are glazed, to overlook one of the voids down to the returns desk of the library. Others have no windows, others have few walls. Many walls finish just above head level, and some overlooked rooms have no ceilings.

In some spaces, these varations seem to work together, particularly the top floor spaces of the under-graduate architecture school (at least at this moment when it is being used for exhibition.)

But overall, it is as if there has been no real engagement in the specific characteristics of education, particularly art and design education. There is no acknowledgement of the complexities of sharing, ownership, belonging, security and privacy at different scales/different locations/times for both staff and students. The IMAGE of openness is lovely, the realities much more less successful. Sound travels everywhere, uncontrolled. If stuff is left out its messiness is on show to the world (and easy to steal), but there is no way to hide it away/store it appropriately.

Education is not an office, nor merely a more flexibly and artistically arranged version of one.

A nice little gizmo

2009-06-11T08:39:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it is really nice to come across interactive web resources that really 'get' the distinctiveness of art and design. So I recommend that you try out Sketchbook developed by Julia Gaimster at the University of the Arts.

What is creativity, again?

2009-06-03T01:19:00.000-07:00

Did a workshop at another event exploring creativity and innovation last week, at the Creativity Centre (part of the CETLD-C University of Sussex and Brighton collaboration) . Organised by the University of Brighton's Centre for Learning and Teaching (CLT) it brought together for sharing and debate some projects around creativity going at the university.

The day was introduced through a talk by Ray Land who, together with Eric Meyer, has written on 'threshold concepts' and 'troublesome knowledge' as a way of grasping and interrogating the complex processes through which students 'get' the key ideas and practices of their subject discipline - and the 'liminality' of learning spaces this implies.

He talked a lot about the relationships between learning and creativity, both of which he articulated as liminal spaces. However - sometimes - creativity seemed to be being defined within the popular commonsense as something outside of everyday learning, as a letting go/anything is possible/do what you want kind of activity. He often linked it to chaos and to transgressive acts "where normal rules are abandoned".

For me, this is a misunderstanding of creativity - as something separate to and more uncontrollable than, 'normal' learning. As we tried to show in the ADM-HEA YouTube video (mentioned in my last post which was appropriated (!) pretty directly from Fischli and Weiss's Der Lauf Der Dinge/The Ways Things Go) - the best creativity integrates the asking of unexpected questions with rigorous processes of experimentation and testing. It is not 'outside' or a different kind of learning, but central to how all learning takes place.

But I agree with Ray Land absolutely that such processes are anxiety-inducing and complex - liminal spaces - which need to be both protective ('holding environments' in Winnicott's phrase) and enable risk-taking. The work he and Eric Meyer (and others) have done in this field - particularly Overcoming Barriers to Student Understanding - remains a very valuable resource in helping us re-think learning spaces.

Play is a serious business

2009-06-03T01:03:00.000-07:00

Attended the HEA-ADM Vital Space conference recently - well not so much a conference, more a creative discursive space (!)which intersected the live event with an ongoing virtual blog... and culminated in a set of 60 sec. YouTube videos. Stephen Heppell of UltraLab (which mainly works in the schools sector) kicked things off with a YouTube talk, proposing key concepts for better learning spaces. David Clews, Director of the HEA-ADM responded in kind; and then at the event itself, groups were allocated a concept to explore.

My group had playful. What was interesting is that all the groups immediately got involved in the complexity and tensions of their concepts, wanting to think harder about what was going on beyond the cliches. Our group all felt there was already a big problem with the concept of playful just meaning brightly coloured beanbags, being 'touch-feely' and having 'fun'. We talked a lot about the serious business of play as taking creative risks and all that that implied. How can students be supported in this? What kinds of spaces do they need? How can it be developed within contexts where resources are short and this kind of play/risk-taking difficult to asssess/challenging to conventional methods?

So our group tried to express this notion of playfulness - click here to see our video.

A hot topic!

2009-03-16T05:14:00.000-07:00

Learning Spaces in Higher Education seems an increasingly hot topic, with lots of events going on. The Reinvention Centre (Oxford Brookes/Warwick) has their next conference at the beginning of April - their Fourth Social Learning Space Symposium: Learning Outside of the Square , and Plymouth University are holding Boundary Changes: Re-defining Learning Spaces at the end of April. Sheffield Hallam and Sheffield Universities have just started up a Learning Spaces Special Interest Group (SIG). In London, the University of the Arts is planning a follow up to their successful 'Space to Think' event last year with another conference this summer. And the ADM-HEA Annual Forum is also on Space. (They have also been running a student essay writing competition in Learning Spaces.)

So why does it still feel as if this area remains under-theorised or developed. Where are the well-argued and susbstantive publications rather than just downloadable case pdfs? Where is the academic research rather than the consultancy-driven case studies? interestingly the book I am writing as part of this CETLD work is being published under architecture - the education editors said there was not enough demand in the educational field.......not sure that the people organising/attending all these events would agree....

Image of playground pods by Jos Boys, Acklam Burghley School, Camden, London

What are the Sticking Places?

2009-02-19T09:21:00.000-08:00

As part of the second Learning Spaces seminar, we talked about whether the concept of 'sticking places' - or to use the proper term, Threshold Concepts - is a useful idea for art and design education. This is the proposal that particular concepts are key to the development of mastery in a discipline but are often problematic because they are counter-intuitive and difficult to grasp. For Meyer and Land (2006. p22) learning involves the occupation of a liminal space.... a kind of teenagehood, where they fluctuate backwards and forwards between different kinds of understanding.

So - what are the things that art and design students have 'to get'; and how can that process be supported? I suggested that, from my experience the first thing an architectural student has to 'get' is how to look differently; not just noticing landmark buildings or making commonsense divisions between what is ugly and what is beautiful, but viewing every single space/object with a critical and creative eye, for its potential to inform their own creative work.

As the groups talked, they were most interested in what students themselves bring to the process - in who defines when you 'get it' and in the broader processes of becoming/being a learner and becoming/being a practitioner, rather than, say, the problems of learning specific concepts. For one group a key set of sticking places was about the identity of becoming a student - the desire to engage in learning - understanding/acquiring a subject culture/ethos - which is bound up in teaching and learning approaches and methods. Another was the process of developing critical awareness - seeing multiple perspectives - positioning self/gaining ownership - communicating ownership/position using (and possible subverting) the conventions of the discipline. Both groups came to a similar conclusion - that the key threshold concept is being able to articulate their subject well and therefore pass it on (beyond the boundaries of their own discipline).

Rather than a series of individual 'moments' then, sticking places seemed to be more like a journey over a very uneven terrain, with learners (and tutors) bringing different kinds of more or less suitable equipment.

What does 'matter' about space?

2009-01-19T08:58:00.000-08:00

The participants in the CETLD Does Space Matter? workshop - mentioned below - were first asked to describe (on a postcard) one 'good' and one 'bad' learning space they had personally experienced, either as a tutor or a student. Then groups compared notes and drew/mapped out key terminology and characteristics.

Not suprisingly, some of the most immediate issues were around basic issues of comfort; rooms that were too hot or cold, too noisy, "unwelcoming", the wrong size, shape or badly planned for the activities that went on in them.

But the more we talked, the more it felt like these issues were just first steps; things that should, after all, 'work' in any space. Whilst some participants emphasised the importance of flexibility and informality, others were also interested in trying to tease out the issues for, and value of, many different types of learning spaces. This involved thinking abut the usefulness of more complex and potentially contradictory terms - beyond simple oppositions (formal/informal, rigid/flexible, single-directional/multi-directional) - such as territory, authority, situation and safety. As one group wrote - "there is no such thing as a good or bad space, it's all contingent."

Evaluating Learning Spaces

2009-01-19T08:28:00.000-08:00

One of the key problems - of course - about making better learning spaces, is how to evaluate 'success'. As someone said at our first CETLD Learning Spaces seminar at the University of Brighton last week (Does Space Matter?) a lot of developments seem to be about making spaces 'nicer'; brighter colours, better lighting, more informality, better integrated technologies. But students liking a space is not the same as it enhancing their learning (although it might overlap).

The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC), who are reponsible for developing UK unniversity and college technology services, have recently funded a study by LSRI at the University of Nottingham to build a compendium of evaluation techniques for learning spaces. This follows on from the JISC Learner Experiences research which is currently offering workshops across the country about evaluation methods (see sidebar). Called JELS, the new work aims to bring together and review the range of methods currently used to investigate the effectiveness of learning spaces: visit their website to find out more and to participate.

Note: The Does Space Matter seminar was the first of 3: for details of the others (and to register) go to the CETLD website.

I want social networking +

2008-11-26T12:11:00.001-08:00

For people interested in developing new technologies for learning, the enormous growth in online social networking (through Web 2.0 applications like Facebook and MySpace) seems to offer a way forward for student-centred, collaborative approaches. Enthusiasts for new technologies are also hopeful that it will change the way we teach and learn – shifting relationships between tutor and students, and instigating informal and social rather than formal and hierarchical structures.

The big question here is, does social networking translate to education, and if so, how?

At the same time, with virtual and immersive environments like Second Life also becoming popular there is another thread developing which looks to computer gaming for a model; with its task setting, competitive sharing and increasingly difficult levels, is this more like education? As part of the reLIVE Second Life conference (see previous post) I helped a University of Brighton researcher called Lars Wieneke with participant feedback. Lars is developing web interfaces based on task sharing/gameplay for learning about cultural heritage and his audience was asked to ‘perform’ a painting in Second Life. What was most interesting was that, first, everyone found it difficult NOT to engage with the painting by wanting information about it; and that, second, as they performed its characters and their relationships instead, they all wanted to go and see the actual work. So an action in Second Life was leading to a motivation to do something in the real world. That seemed like a positive and creative outcome, even if neither Lars nor I had been expecting it. So that is another thought which may lead somewhere, but not quite sure where...

image of the painting workshop participants were asked to 'perform' in character - Velazquez's Las Meninas 1656

And then there is Second Life..

2008-11-24T07:21:00.000-08:00

Went to the reLIVE conference at the Open University last week, and got my first proper introduction to Second Life, in the company of people who spend as much time there as the real world. For anyone interested in 'space' - and our everyday social and spatial interactions - Second Life is an extraordinary place. It is huge, an enormous world of islands, events and networks. It seems to be a complex mixture which both replicates real world social relationships/spaces and enables surreal, parallel and re-invented ones. So the basic landscapes conform to gravity and people tend to make their avatars face each other at an 'appropriate' social distance when text-talking. But then these figures might have bushy tails, or be dressed in extraordinary costumes, or (if you building skills are good enough) are in the shape of something else like crows or fish. It is quite strange to have a conversation with a fish rotating around your stomach.

With nearly 50 million people globally who are SL members, it feels like we should be understanding what is going on. For people interested in learning in Second Life, the key explorations currently seem to be around simulations (disaster scenarios, historical enactments) and 3D social networking/informal learning. But I think what stunned me the most was the huge amount of creativity going into making artefacts, spaces and developing social (including sexual) connections. From choosing, finding or designing clothes; to creating buildings; to generating events or objects to sell; to playing a game based on having a child and it growing up; personal, social and commercial creatvity is central. And I don't even know how to begin mapping or analysing what is going on.

image from Lars Wieneke workshop entitled 'cultural tinkering', reLIVE conference workshop. OU, 20th Nov 2008

Space costs!

2008-11-13T06:37:00.000-08:00

One of the most interesting things about the Explore it! toolkit launch at the University of Dundee (see below) was how many estates and facilities managers were there, keen on finding out how to generate more innovative policies and approaches to learning spaces development and design. Estates people and academics can find it all to easy to stereotype each other: teachers are perceived as unwilling to shift from their existing practices (single offices, course or department 'owned' spaces, last minute planning and and 'just-in-time' room-booking) whilst estates managers are seen as obsessed with space utilisation figures and cost-saving, un-interested in the demands of teaching and learning.

The truth is, space costs - and with increasing pressure on university finances, we all need to be collaborating on how to creatively think/procure/design/implement/manage space better. This is about more than better briefing (although of course that helps too). We also need to develop better understandings of the relationships between material space and the teaching and learning practices which take place in it. It is only when we know more about what actually happens that we can decide priorities and explore what might change. And I should mention that, to date, it has been the estates and facilities management team at the university who have been talking about this to me ( and about the potential to be more adventurous), not academics....

Another day, another building...

2008-11-07T08:17:00.001-08:00

Another day, another building visit - this time to Telford College in Edinburgh. This design (the subject of many case studies) is interesting because it offers a very clear 'diagram' of how educational spaces could change as information and communication technologies (ICT) become ubiquitous to learning.

Telford College (by HOK architects) is formed around a large atrium which combines a cafe with informal learning spaces and wireless connection to the university portal. This high, light and top-lit space is surrounded by several floors of classrooms all linked by spines of 'learning streets' - extra wide double-height corridors. These colour-coded learning streets contain rows of open access computers, together with alcoves at various intervals (and used for various things) and are supported by a help-desk in each spine.

Staff accommodation is also different to most universities and colleges - everyone put together into one 3,000 sqm open plan office, with 85% hot-desking supported by a variety of informal and formal social and group spaces.

Interestingly, I combined this visit with going to the launch of the Explore It toolkit at the University of Dundee. Designed by DEGW, together with the University of Strathclyde, the toolkit is crucially about helping those participating in new buildings or adaptations to imagine the possibilities; through a series of diagrammatic and inter-changeable building plan drawings.

The Explore It toolkit focusses on academic workplaces, suggesting a series of different core arrangements (called Studies, Quarters, Clusters, Hubs and Clubs) with different implications for staff activities and relationships. The bottom line is, of course, how to reduce the amount of space most universities allocate to academics and the perceived under-occupation of this space. From this website, you can also download the background research paper entitled "The changing academic workplace" by Andrew Harrison and Antonia Cairns from DEGW - all part of the Effective Spaces for Working in Higher and Further Education project funded by the Scottish Funding Council.

A space for crossing boundaries

2008-11-07T07:52:00.001-08:00

Recently visited Whitespace at the University of Abertay, Dundee. This converted building was opened in 2007, and is intended as a hub for activities bringing together Computer Arts students, PhD students, lecturers, business clients, broadcasters and artists. As well as educational sessions, the space contains in-house graphics and digital media teams providing professional services, new business start-up units and state-of-the-art digital media suites - all of which offer the potential to bring students, academics, practitioners and businesses together in many innovative, flexible and creative ways. The space is zoned into different but overlapping and (mainly) open areas, each with their own spatial and aesthetic characteristics.

Of course, this only works because the underlying roles, relationships and working practices of the various participants have also been re-orchestrated..... with very interesting implications for curriculum design and working/learning patterns. For me it really expressed what can happen when positive intersections between the campus and its community and business contexts - what the virtual world calls distributed creativity - are embedded into physical space.

Extending in every direction!

2008-10-27T02:54:00.000-07:00

If the notion of learning spaces is already extending in every direction in this blog - beyond the campus, across virtual and physical spaces, linking learning with civic engagement - then here is yet another additional area; universities as sites of urban and cultural regeneration. The RIBA and CABE together run a project called Building Futures one element of which is called 'future scenarios in higher education' looking at the relationship between university campus development and increasing student numbers with the wider environments in which this is taking place. The site includes a position paper, written by Eeva Burglund called "Universities and their cities - some observations for a framing of debate.". All these developments suggest that it is no longer possible to assume that either the university or 'learning' are simple or bounded spaces; they cannot be isolated from wider contexts and processes.

The value of metaphor?

2008-10-04T07:52:00.000-07:00

Went to visit the Public Gallery recently in West Bromwich, both to see the fully interactive exhibition areas and the - as yet undesigned - new Learning Space. The interior is an extraordinary layering of open pods linked via a ramp (you go to the top and then circulate down), interweaved with a Ben Kelly designed set of tree structures with giant computer screen leaves. Visitors to the gallery accumulate personalised data as they journey through the spaces (on an interactive tag they carry), finishing up with the opportunity to translate their collected images into a self-created souvenir. It is not all up and running yet, so still too early to say what kind of impact this environment is going to make on its participants. In the meantime the gallery is exploring what kind of learning space would support and develop its activities.

Zoe Partington-Sollinger, Head of Learning and Tom Hamilton (from InQbate) have together been developing ideas through a workshop, now being discussed with the architect and others. At this stage metaphors seem key - ideas around 'camping' currently to the fore. Other participatory processes, such as the work Woods Bagot did with the University of Melbourne earlier this year, also seem to find metaphors useful - there ideas about cafes, sandpits and gardens. What is nice about these notions is they can help to break away from functional or behaviourist analyses of space; but what is problematic is how they actually translate into spaces that support creative learning.

A forest of educational concepts!

2008-09-18T01:38:00.000-07:00

Seem to keep having discussions recently with art and design practitioners and teachers about the 'problem' of educational language. There is a perceived surfeit of pedagogic terms which fail to offer -it seems - much purchase with their interests in, and experiences of, teaching art and design subjects. How important or useful is it to know about constructivist models, experiental learning, resource-based learning, problem-based learning, learning styles, deep and surface learning, threshold concepts or action learning sets?

Will return to this issue. Meanwhile, came across Jame Atherton's website(s) which offers a very wide ranging and informative introduction into the whole subject.

Spaces in-between the Conversational Framework

2008-08-18T09:03:00.000-07:00

Laurillard's Conversational Framework has rightly had a strong impact on our understanding of how teaching and learning 'works'. But, increasingly, research about learning is exploring the spaces in-between this framework. Researchers are beginning to examine the emotional/non-verbal aspects of learning as a conversational process; what we each bring to it in terms of hopes, desires, beliefs and confidence, and how this may affect students differently, depending on their backgrounds and attitudes. What if knowledge is also contested, as well as understood/mastered by the student through guidance from the tutor? Or contested between tutors?

Ideas about threshold concepts (or sticking places) also potentially challenge the smoothness of the Laurillard conversational flow; what if we actually learn in jumps and starts, if there is something we just dont 'get' however well it is explained? Does this change the shape of the framework or merely alters how it operates as a process of conversations through time? And of course - what is the impact of the conceptual, physical and virtual spaces on the conversation? The Conversational Framework is a key starting point, but it raises as many questions as it answers.

Sites of exchange

2008-07-25T03:47:00.000-07:00

Updating links to the blog today, I can see myself constantly drawn to sites which seem to be really exploiting web 2.0 not just for social networking-as-gossip but for active social exchange and engagement. These are based on newer understandings, building on the wisdom of crowds concept central to Web 2.0. Interestingly the SITES OF EXCHANGE websites now listed on the sidebar use phrases like civic media (MIT Media Lab), distributed creativity (Re-public) and public authoring (proboscis).

These sites enable individuals and groups to work together, to provide peer support (Horsesmouth) and to undertake creative exchange through real world and virtual interactions (SFZero and Institute of Infinitely Small Things). In short, they are creative spaces, where ideas are shared, explored, transformed and re-made as processes and/or products.

Just as importantly, there is a move to more equal and reciprocal relationships between participants - rather than, say as often assumed between tutor and learner . This suggests some potential not just for virtual learning spaces but also for how to re-think face-to-face learning and teaching. It conceptualises a space where people learn from each other, based on a rcognition and sharing of expertise; and where not just information is exchanged, but also creative actions.

Click here for more on the wisdom of crowds (but note Wikipedia warning)
Image from Inspired Learning Spaces blog (see sidebar) July 21 2008

What counts as a 'good' learning space?

2008-07-22T07:09:00.000-07:00

As reported in the newspapers yesterday, despite £35bn spent by the government on revamping educational buildings across the UK, "a new generation of mediocre schools" is in danger of being produced. The Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) has reported that the design quality of many of these new learning spaces is not satisfactory.

What does this mean about spaces for learning at university and college level? Well, first, we need to look hard at what criteria CABE are developing for judging what exactly is a good learning space for secondary school children. For example, they say:

The best designs are getting it right, with plenty of natural light and ventilation; lively and stimulating spaces for learning; generous, atriums and pleasant spaces for pupils to dine and relax; toilets designed to deter bullying; and easy routes to move quickly around the school.

Interestingly, I feel that debates in higher education tend to conceptualise space in different ways to this; and that these differences would be worth unravelling a bit...

Second, we need to consider why these newly built learning spaces are been deemed non-satisfactory. Some would say it is the PFI procurement process; others will blame the architects and others the lack of adequate briefing or understanding by schools themselves. So - what can we learn - how can we not only imagine but also sucessfully realise better learning spaces in and beyond university campuses?

See CABE report "Threshold needed to halt poor school design">
Image: Michael Tippett Special Education Needs school, the first BSF school in London, 2008. Designed by Marks Barfield Architects

Following "Space to Think"

2008-07-17T07:31:00.000-07:00

The University of the Arts London (UAL) held a one day conference called "Space to Think" on 2nd July 2008 at the Chelsea School of Art and Design. This event explored the pedagogic, design and development issues around making good learning spaces for art and design; using the examples of the recently completed Chelsea School (next to Tate Britain in London) and the planned new Central Saint Martin (CSM) building at Kings Cross.

These were fascinating topics and many participants that day felt we had only had time to scratch the surface. UAL is planning to host an annual event - in the meantime, we thought that CETLD and this SPACES FOR LEARNING blog could act as a place for comments and debate to develop; for people at that event and elsewhere to network, for knowledge to be shared; and for core resources on learning spaces in art and design to be accumulated.

Download the "Space to Think" conference outline >
Image: Chelsea School of Art and Design refurbishment by architects Allies and Morrison

Why Spaces for Learning in Art and Design?

2008-07-17T07:00:00.000-07:00

Learning Spaces is a bit of a buzz topic right now. In the physical world the UK has the Building Schools for the Future programme re-designing secondary schools and a considerable amount of new and refurbished building is also going on in further and higher education. At the same time, the increasing ubiquity of new kinds of non-physical spaces - such as social networking and virtual worlds like Second Life - is leading people (including educationalists) to ask whether people are, could be, or should be learning differently these days.

For me, coming from an architectural background but with a lot of experience in both e-learning and art/design education, it feels like this subject is developing fast. But it remains limited because we are not thinking through the difficulties in connecting across the different perspectives of architects, academics and pedagogic theorists (let alone estates managers or students). So whilst some very interesting buildings and spaces for learning in art and design now exist, we have to ask whether - and how - these really enhance students' creativity, engagement and performance. We have to ask what are the actual relationships between social networking online, virtual environments and improving learning. And we have to ask hard questions about why pedagogic theories and new e-learning approaches continue to fail to appeal to the great majority of art and design tutors.

Image: from 'Own Room' project, exploring the minimum conditions for creativity - Access and Foundation into Architecture and Interiors, London Metropolitan University, 2001.