building speaks on its own and tells the story of students learning in deep and modern ways .
A Place of Caring
Schools can be institutional . Many have been designed to maximize functionality and get as many students through a school day as possible . The mission of learning communities continues to be caring for children , and the space can be a key component . Do students feel a sense of belonging ? Do they have spaces that support their many needs ? Leaders are redesigning to maximize care , concern , and belonging ?
New Ways of Learning
Connected learning that brings students to experts and experts to students is hard to realize in desks and rows . Critical thinking struggles in spaces that aren ’ t filled with questions and places to explore . Collaboration between classes , grade levels , and students can be maximized when there are common spaces that support the movement and space that students and teachers need to design these experiences .
Build New Leaders
Excellent school leaders are swamped in both the urgent and significant tasks of each day , and the need to build internal leadership capacity to fully realize a distributed leadership model is central to their long-term effectiveness . Rethinking and redesigning can be a vehicle for building capacity . As teachers and staff see themselves as space designers , they are freed to make other decisions about the learning environment . This empowerment means more and more decisions that support kids by design .
The research continues to support the positive impacts that are possible with changes to the learning spaces , and many leaders are seeing the power that space design has had on individual classrooms . All of this is helping to nudge more and more school and district leaders to see learning space changes as essential to the work as pedagogical change and digital changes . Ultimately , these three areas work as a triad for meaningful change .
Every space in every school has room to grow in its design . There are way too many tired spaces that speak loudly to parents , teachers , students , and the community . They can leave people believing that the school says one thing and does another . They can leave people believing that the level of detail for success isn ’ t present at the
32 essentials | spring 2018