School Buildings for the 21st Century: Some Features of New School Buildings in Iceland

Abstract

The aim of this study is to identify features of change in the recent design of school buildings in Iceland, and how they might affect teaching practices. Environmental and architectonic features characterising school buildings designed and built at the beginning of the 21st century are examined in light of challenges involving architecture, educational ideology, school policy and digital technology. The sample for the study consists of 20 schools located in four municipalities. Four of the school buildings were developed and built in this century, while the other 16 were designed in the 20th century. The design of all of the buildings wasexplored and reviewed by a multidisciplinary team. Data was collected by observations and photography at each school site, as well as by reviewing technical documents. The relationship between school design and school practices was studied through a questionnaire survey among all teachers, in order to find out whether teachers working in new environmentsdiffer from teachers in more traditional classroom settings. The results indicate a clear shift in the design of educational buildings. Flexibility, flow, openness and teamwork seem to guide recent school design. Clusters of classrooms or open spaces, transparent or movable boundaries, as well as shared spaces allowing for manifold interactions in flexible groupsseem to be replacing traditional classrooms along confining corridors. Teachers working in open classroom environments collaborate more often than their counterparts. Teaching practices are also characterised by more opportunities for pupils to choose between tasks and enjoy more variation regarding group division and workspace arrangements.

The risks of standardised school building design: Beyond aligning the parts of a learning environment

“…Building design in Europe similarly follows these national imperatives, with these open and flexible designs much more prevalent and currently preferred in some countries, such as the Nordic countries (see e.g. Grannäs and Stavem, 2020;Sigurðardóttir and Hjartarson, 2011), than in others, where enclosed classroom prevail even in new buildings (see e.g. Duthilleul et al, 2019).…”

Learning lessons from the collaborative design of guidance for new build schools

“…As shown in Woolner et al (2018), compelling research demonstrates that different physical configurations facilitate some paedagogical approaches while hindering others. Sigurðardóttir and Hjartarson (2011) in a study of new school buildings in Iceland found evidence that teachers were more likely to collaborate in open-plan classrooms and that students had more choice in the tasks they chose, while open-plan schools foster student involvement, teacher cooperation, collaboration and, often, team-teaching. However, Saltmarsh et al (2015) argue that open-plan classrooms cause considerable pedagogic challenges for teachers.…”

V. 3 N. 6 (2022)

“…Barret et al, 2019, reporting for the World Bank) and extensive investment in educational infrastructure in many countries (EC interim paper, 2022), there is enthusiasm for Innovative Learning Environments -ILEs. This interest includes research and policy papers from the OECD (OECD, 2013; and school building programs centering on particular, innovative, open and flexible designs (Bradbeer et al, 2017;Niemi, 2021;Sigurðardóttir & Hjartarson, 2011). The intention is that schools built to these designs that provide variation in the type of spaces available 2 can support a wider range of pedagogies, teaching and learning activities and student groupings.…”

“…The intention is that schools built to these designs that provide variation in the type of spaces available 2 can support a wider range of pedagogies, teaching and learning activities and student groupings. These aspects are often seen as enabling individualized or personalized learning, where the teaching staff can respond to each student's particular learning needs (Sigurðardóttir & Hjartarson, 2011). Another key, underpinning, intention of these designs is to promote student autonomy by enabling more student directed learning through providing scholars with more choice about how and where they engage with learning activities (Carvalho & Yeonman, 2018; for a thoughtful discussion on the relationship between innovative learning and alternative forms of school architecture, see Schabmann et al, 2016).…”