Questions on My Mind about the Psychology of School Design
- What are examples of innovative schools right now? I wonder what schools of the future will look like. Which schools are best designed to cater to individual learning styles and goals?
- What’s the correlation between classroom windows and grades? I’ve read studies about how a window view at work increases wellbeing. I wonder if the same happens for students, where window views lead to happier students which leads to higher grades. Or if windows instead serve as a distraction.
- What’s the correlation between seating position and grades? I wonder if there’s a self-fulfilling prophecy where teachers regard students who sit at the front of the classroom in higher esteem. Which leads to those students getting higher grades.
- How do students fair when they have different subjects in different classrooms? I remember in elementary school, I’d have one classroom for all of my subjects. But when I got to middle school, I had a different classroom for each subject. I wonder if there are studies that have examined the difference in success between those two scenarios.
- How does learning in the field affect retention? Field trips were often single day experiences for me. But as I get older, internships and hands-on learning were to be more emphasized. I wonder if grade schools could benefit from more long-term immersive experiences.
- How do people learn differently in minimalist vs maximalist environments? It seems to me that classrooms become more and more minimalist as we get older. I wonder what effects this has on our ability to learn and on how much we enjoy learning.
- How do recess breaks influence learning? I wonder if adults should have recess.
- What are individual differences that affect where people learn best? I’ve noticed, for example, that I have a hard time working in public places, but I thrive when working in a private space where I can talk aloud and walk around.
- How does the availability of fidget toys affect different people?
- What’s the correlation between class size and ability to learn? Class size defined as number of students and physical area of room.
- How does the time of day affect people’s ability to learn? I wonder how the amount of light (natural or artificial) affect people’s ability to learn. I notice my brain works best in the morning and I’d assume this is not the same for everyone. What would it look like if schools catered to our individual rhythms?
- How does weather affect our ability to learn?
- How do competitive vs cooperative environments affect our ability to learn? For example, some people learn well through collaboration by tutoring others. On the other hand some people shine in stressful/pressure-filled environments.
- How do reminders of resolve aid learning? Displaying pictures of practical role models for when students have the inevitable question “when will I ever need to use what you’re teaching me right now.”
- How does comfort influence learning? Clothing and seating.
- How can movement facilitate learning? I feel most engaged when I have enough floor space to walk around and in dynamic environments where I can switch up my seating (chair, floor pillow, standing desk, etc).
- How could it help or hurt for each student to have their own desk that they return to everyday? Does returning to the same desk day after day help or hurt?
- How are classrooms designed and styled differently depending on the grade of its students or subject matter? What if every classroom was as bright and colourful as a kindergarten or art room?
- How are schools and classrooms designed differently around the world?
- What would it look like if schools were designed based on specific learning values? I wonder how a school that values experimentation and exploration would look compared to a school that valued mastery and achievement.
- How does having access to our second or third brain influence what it means to learn something? I wonder what my experience in school would’ve looked like if I had the digital environment I’ve created for myself today.
- How can we figure out our ideal learning environments?
- How can our spaces be better designed for information storage and retrieval? Optimizing capture habits, for example.
Reference Dump
- Recess episode without recess
- Taking tests in the same place you study
- The school that was redesigned after a shooting
- Matilda
- Magic School Bus
- Gilmore Girls
- Sunny Classrooms
In a study of elementary schools, students in classrooms with the most daylight advances as much as 26 percent faster in reading and 20 percent faster in math over the course of a year.