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Designing science laboratories: learning environments, school architecture and teaching and learning models

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Abstract

This article on secondary schools science laboratories in Portugal focuses on how school space functions as a pedagogical and political instrument by contributing to shape the conditions for teaching and learning dynamics. The article places the impact of changes to school layouts within the larger context of a public school renovation programme, discussing how school space functions as a pedagogical and political instrument. The focus is on science laboratories as a particular learning environment for science education. The study, conducted between 2010 and 2011 in 13 renovated schools within the framework of the Portuguese Secondary School Modernisation Programme, drew on document analysis, interviews, pupil and teacher surveys and site-specific focus groups. One of the main findings is that teachers found that science laboratories were the most controversial and debated of all the renovated learning spaces. Considering that the science laboratory layout was intended to be universal across all schools, there was little intervention by the architects responsible for the renovation of the schools. Focusing on the analysis of the decision to change the science laboratory design within the aims of the education policy, this article discusses how teachers’ criticisms were a response to some of the educational policy goals underlying the renovation of school buildings and the potential impact on science education, namely, the relationship between flexibility of space organisation and pedagogical approaches.

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Fig. 1

Source: Parque Escolar (2009)

Fig. 2

Source: Laboratórios Escolares (http://laboratoriosescolares.net/moodle)

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Fig. 9

Source: Laboratórios Escolares (http://laboratoriosescolares.net/moodle)

Fig. 10

Source: Parque Escolar (http://www.parque-escolar.pt)

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Notes

  1. The list of the project’s publications is available at http://innoschool.tkk.fi/framet/Julkaisut/INNOSCHOOL_Publications_2nd_Phase.pdf.

  2. For the pupils, we used a stratified random sample based on school year (taking pupils from the 10th and 12th grade in order to cover those who had been in the school both before and after the renovation), gender, course and educational area. The resulting sample of 1655 students enabled us to draw statistical inferences for the universe of pupils from the 10th and 12th grades of the selected schools. The sample presents a confidence level of 95% and the sampling error varied between 7 and 9%. For the teachers, because the schools did not provide a list, we were unable to obtain a representative sample. The survey was sent to all teachers, resulting in 387 responses.

  3. The designation of ‘site-specific focus group’ (Duarte et al. 2015) has been proposed as a way of labelling focus groups that are anchored to a space and in which the participants’ interactions and discussions can only be understood within the particular spatial context. This context is equally social and symbolic, because it is in relation to it that people express themselves, move and interact.

  4. See Fernandes et al. (2009) reference to two other projects: the Scale-Up from North Carolina University and Laboratory 21 from Northern Ireland.

  5. These were large and fixed structures made of marble, fully equipped with the laboratory material, and placed in the centre of the room, like islands.

  6. In Portugal, there exists a particular school, known as Escola da Ponte, where, along with other dimensions, embraced various principles of the open plan schools and, since the 1970 s until today, is taken as a model. For more details, see a book written by the director of the school (Pacheco 2008).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro de Investigação e Estudos de Sociologia (CIES-IUL), Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Avenida das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal

    Luísa Veloso & Joana S. Marques

  2. Universidade de São Paulo (USP), São Paulo, Brazil

    Joana S. Marques

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  1. Luísa Veloso
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  2. Joana S. Marques
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Correspondence to Luísa Veloso.

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Veloso, L., Marques, J.S. Designing science laboratories: learning environments, school architecture and teaching and learning models. Learning Environ Res 20, 221–248 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10984-017-9233-1

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