Building learning places - and learning about places and buildings!

Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.

The built environment is hugely important to all of us, allowing us to live our lives in particular ways, and perhaps even constraining our lives in ways we don't yet recognise or understand. The buildings in which we live and work shape the way we look at ourselves and others, with questions of perceived status revealed by the condition of the environments in which people can be found. This, of course, is why Building Schools for the Future is such an interesting project, with opportunities abounding to make bold statements about the value we as a society put on our children - and on education.

As a parent governor of my son's primary school, and a project manager for many school building projects, I often see how engaged young people are with their environment. There are the big ideas of the environment, such as global warming, but there are many more smaller ideas, too. Just asking the question "if you could design your school, what would you like to see there?" has illuminating responses. I have received answers that range from the highly practical (more toilets, and more drinking fountains outside), to the highly desirable (I think we'd all agree that a lake of chocolate within the school grounds would be ace, though problematic on oh-so-many health and safety grounds!). Such a question can be a fantastic platform for learning about all sorts of issues...