These Key
Elements Are
Transforming
How Designers
Approach
Educational
Environments
| Heavy backpacks, cubbies,
and lockers are out. So are
rigid, blackboard-facing desks
and chairs with students
absorbing lectures and working
independently from textbooks.
Driven by the digital
transformation and the adoption
of new approaches to learning,
today’s multi-faceted classroom
incorporates collaboration,
movement, and technology. This
more dynamic, fluid learning
style has reshaped the way
contemporary classrooms
are designed and furnished,
from tables and seating to
writing surfaces and classroom
configuration.
|
TECH-CONSCIOUS
Technology is perhaps the biggest change-maker to today’s learning environment, and the educational furnishings students need to incorporate tech reflect that.
Interactive whiteboards and easels support web-based learning for multiple users, while charging stations integrated into desks and seating are a must to prevent dead batteries. Configuring students at shared tables allows for both independent tablet or computer work, while promoting group problem-solving.
|
COLLABORATIVE
Collaborative learning is a teaching style in which each student is a dynamic contributor to both the learning and the teaching process. By nurturing students’ emotional intelligence, they develop communication, empathy, and teamwork – critically important skills they’ll need as they transition into the workforce.
As a result, the traditional single-user desk is being replaced by modular-shaped tables and desktops that can easily be reconfigured for individual, small, or large-group learning. Collaborative classrooms may also contain soft seating areas for gathering and dry-erase tabletops that offer an instant creative surface for students to work together and jot down notes on the fly.
|
INTEGRATED
Modern learning emphasizes different teaching approaches to different educational needs, as well as different approaches to varying learning styles among students – all of which must be integrated into one space. A modern classroom should have spaces for both collaboration and self-directed learning.
To do this, designers integrate barrier-free privacy pods or nooks that allow students to work independently without feeling excluded. The addition of side-by-side seating allows teacher-student assessment areas to be private yet non-confrontational.
|
MOVEMENT
Developed out of teaching centers that work with special-needs children, the ability to move and circulate within a classroom is quickly becoming the standard for all. Furniture that promotes micromovements helps to create rhythm or pulse, and that leads to focus.
Yoga balls and wobble stools engage kinesthetic learners. Desks and tables that are easily height adjustable help students who learn better while standing. By adding soft seating, like couches and floor pods, students are stimulated physically and mentally, and are better able to learn.
|
ADJUSTABILITY
One of the hallmarks of modern education is the ability to adapt to the numerous ways in which kids learn. To support this, modern classrooms must be flexible – both in terms of the furnishings and space.
Chairs can easily adjust to accommodate different heights. Desks on casters in a variety of shapes make for easy clustering of groups. Even the teacher’s desk, once huge and heavy in the corner of the room, is changing to reflect the needs of the modern educator. Light and mobile, it can easily transform from lectern to workstation.
|
Information provided by Mooreco, Inc.
| |
|
|
