Why Schools?

Pre industrial Societies--

• No concept of childhood• 13 yrs is adult• Low productivity low life expectancy..• No school• By mentoring was knowledge passed.

Current definition----grouping students together in a centralized location for learning..Wikipedia

Gurukula system- Guru stayed with students. Before the British came was the norm…teaching happened in temples, mosques, villages—most subjects were taught…arithmetic, language,religion….

Greek Academy

• Then came religions-organized kinds-going by a book.

• Wanting to expand need followers• Need trainers….

Madrasa-i al-NizamiyyaKhargird, Iran ( Arch Net) Islam was another culture that developed a school system in the modern sense of the word. Emphasis was put on knowledge, which required a systematic way of teaching and spreading knowledge, and purpose-built structures…..(Wikepedia)

Loyola School, Chennai, India — run by the Catholic Diocese of Madras. Christian missionaries played a pivotal role in establishing modern schools in India. Wikipedia

• Industrialization made people come to cities—They were employed in production-repetitive work…

• Poverty & increase in population went hand in hand—

• Exploitation --- children as young as 4 yrs. were employed--

India has the highest number of child labourers working in very excruciating circumstances –one being the brick kilns almost as slaves.

Humanism and urbanization and Great Depression changed he laws with respect to employment of children in factories----So spaces for children----Spaces for learning and play built with specific purpose.. “Factoriescreated to produce things led to factories to producelearning” (Tanner & Lackney, 2005; Weisser, 2006)

http://www.ncef.org/pubs/greenschoolshistory.pdf

Wiley Elementary School -1899-1924-did not have a playground. The road was policed during breaks and traffic stopped to allow pupil to play.

Waldschule, Charlottenburg, Germany. Classroom and dining sheds. Photograph obtained from 'Designing Modern Childhoods', p.110.

The first open school in Germany…

A disease changed the form of closed classrooms to open air classrooms-Cure for Tuberculosis-- required children to be in open spaces –fresh air….

Uffculme Open-Air School, Birmingham, Great Britain, classroom. Photograph obtained from 'Designing Modern Childhoods', p.114.

The Suresnes Open-Air School (1931-1935)

The Suresnes Open-Air School (1931-1935)

The Suresnes Open-Air School (1931-1935)

Finger plan school----Crow Island School, Perkins & Will Architects, courtesy of Tanner and Lackney, 1940---------

Building schools-building learning culture…

Then came different ways

• Of looking at education---• Open schools• Waldorf Schools• Montessory• Emilio Reggio

Waldorf schools

• Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Anthroposophy. Its pedagogy emphasizes the role of imagination in learning, striving to integrate holistically the intellectual, practical, and artistic development of pupils.

Reggio Emelia

• A town in Italy where the system was developed.

• Community is the teacher of the child• Curriculum developed as to what the

community needs• School like a small town.