No abstract

Despite growing interest in redesigning the material landscape of education, relatively little is known about the impact of these evolving classrooms. This study aimed to gain insight into the physical learning environment and the potential pedagogical impacts thereof. A 'biographical approach ' (c.1963-2015) was used to explore the long-term sociomaterial landscapes where teachers and pupils, classroom material and spatiality, and teaching practices were entangled. Stimulated recall interviews were conducted in Flanders (Belgium) with primary school teachers. Teacher-generated floorplans detailing their material classroom over time, transcribed oral accounts elaborating on these, and supportive data sources were aggregated and analysed by theme. The resulting identification of six key themes shed light on the evolving architectural and infrastructural developments, as well as triggers and teaching impacts thereof amongst the interviewed teachers. Findings show that negative school evaluations urging school intervention, and teachers' proactive engagement within their classrooms, were the main catalysts of change.Moreover, evolving classroom layouts, in addition to the affordances of upgraded equipment, can be associated to changes in teachers' practices.It can be concluded that the classroom is becoming an action context as the result of the inextricable mediating agencies identified."There is something strange about classrooms. (. . .) They are the most well known physical space where formal learning takes place. In classrooms the main players of the education nHenrgame -teachers and pupils -meet. They are like the living cells of the school, the beating heart of the educational system. Classrooms have become a synonym for education. But that does not mean that we know many things about them"

No abstract

No abstract

In the authors' aim to go beyond the 'silent' school desk they returned to sources such as public contracts, photographs, advertising leaflets and (the often neglected) patents kept in the municipal archives of Brussels. In this article, they focus on the first half of the twentieth century and two phases of the 'life-cycle' of the school desk, namely the design phase on the one hand and the production phase on the other hand. What desks were designed and by whom (cf. patents)? Which desks were effectively produced for use in the municipal schools of Brussels? The transition between these two phases - the place where only some designs were brought to 'life' - occupies a special place. The paper concludes with a case study on the school furniture of Oscar Brodsky, a designer who kindled the authors' interest through his publicity campaign of the 1920s and 1930s