Looking Ahead for Learning and Facilities

Ten years ago, “The Future of Job Report” from the World Economic Forum predicted that 65% of the children entering primary school then would end up working in job types that did not yet exist. This has already begun to happen. How can schools prepare learners for skills needed for the next 10 years? 

Educators, architects, engineers, interior designers and furniture specialists have unique opportunities and obligations to design facilities that enhance learning for now and the future. Analytical critical thinking, decision-making, interpersonal awareness, technological knowledge and abilities to embrace change are skills essential for success in life and careers.

Shifts in education and learning can affect how spaces are designed. The shift from teacher instruction to student-centered engagement is key to advancing learning. Student-centered learning embraces project-based problem-solving, team collaboration, peer tutoring, one-on-one engagement, independent study, class lecture and student presentation. 

Traditional “cells-and-bells” classroom layouts fall short of meeting learning needs. Facilities with a variety of flexible and agile spaces inside and outside the classroom advance learning experiences. The Dunn and Dunn learning style model developed in the 1970s supports this idea. Through applied research, Rita Dunn and Kenneth Dunn identified variables that significantly affect individual student learning behaviors. The model identifies these variables: environment (e.g., sound, light, temperature, seating); emotions (e.g., motivation, responsibility-conformity, task persistence, structure); sociological preferences (e.g., learning alone, in pairs, with peer groups, in teams, with an adult); physiological characteristics (e.g., perceptual strengths, intake needs, mobility learning, time-of-day), and psychological processing (e.g, analytical/global, reflective/impulsive). 

Psychologist Howard Gardner challenged traditional views of education with new ways of understanding human intelligence. In his 1983 book, Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences, Gardner identified six intelligences (and later added three) that describe human cognition and potential: verbal-linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial-visual, bodily-visual, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalist and existential. Gardner asserted that because everyone has strengths and weaknesses in various intelligences, curriculum development and teaching should be approached and delivered in multiple ways to tap into each learner’s strengths and confidence levels. 

The 21st century research of Patricia Kuhl, co-director of the Institute for Learning Brain Sciences at the University of Washington, has found that the “social brain” presents opportunities to tap into inherent natural abilities. Learning should feature activities emphasizing collaboration, teamwork, cooperation and peer-to-peer connections, with circular or U-shaped layouts that enable interactions.

It is essential to challenge established pedagogies and design facilities that better align with how students learn. Designing agile spaces that support individual learning behaviors and social brain abilities is key to elevating experiences and connecting to each person’s unique cognition. 

Agile learning areas described as flexible-collaboration spaces, makerspaces, nooks, mountain-tops, and campfires are designed to support learner preferences and aptitudes. Interior spaces may include seminar settings, small-group rooms, large-group forum spaces, social-gathering centers, individual-study nooks, messy-work-creativity areas, and STEAM labs. Facility designs that enhance learning may include views into spaces for instilling curiosity of onlookers to “see” learning, movable partitions for changing room sizes, ubiquitous technology, varying ceiling heights and flexible furniture.

Outdoor spaces may include natural habitat areas, physical education space, areas for vocational construction projects, and gardens incorporating regenerative agriculture. Additional areas may include playgrounds, amphitheaters and canopied space for presentations. 

Educators and facilities design specialists have unique opportunities and obligations to design facilities that support learning today and for the future. Curricula and facilities that support and enhance knowledge and skills development will benefit children, society and the world.

Paul W. Erickson, AIA/NCARB/REFP, partner and senior adviser, is past president and executive officer of ATSR Planners/Architects/Engineers. He has 48 years of experience in school planning, design and construction. Erickson can be reached at [email protected].