Re: Ref wanted: Sitting classroom arrangements

Linda.Fitzgerald who-is-at uni.edu
Fri, 20 Aug 1999 00:23:21 -0500 (CDT)

Hi Eugene!

One of my favorite descriptions of the importance of seating arrangements for
learning is one John Dewey gave to parents at the U. Chicago Lab School in
April 1899, incorporated in the beginning of the 2nd chapter of his _The School
and Society_. (My copy is Dewey, J. (1900/1956). _The child and the curriculum
and The school and society_. Chicago: U. Chicago Press, p. 31):

"Some few years ago I was looking about the school supply stores in the city,
trying to find desks and chairs which seemed thoroughly suitable from all
points of view -- artistic, hygienic, and educational -- to the needs of the
children. We had a great deal of difficulty in finding what we needed, and
finally one dealer, more intelligent that the rest, made this remark: 'I am
afraid we have not what you want. You want something at which the children may
work; these are all for listening.' That tells the story of traditional
education. Just as the biologist can take a bone or two and reconstruct the
whole animal, so, if we put before the mind's eye the ordinary schoolroom, with
its rows of ugly desks placed in geometrical order, crowded together so that
there shall be as little moving room as possible, desks almost all of the same
size, with just space enough to hold books, pencils, and paper, add a table,
some chairs, the bare walls, and possibly a few pictures, we can reconstruct
the only educational activity that can possibly go on in such a place. It is
all made 'for listening' . . . ."

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Somewhere in the middle of the 20th century, Jacob Getzels and/or one of his
students picked up on this Deweyian idea and did a study of activities in
classrooms with various configurations, including the incarnation of Dewey's UC
Lab School at that time, a parochial school, and a south side Chicago public
school, providing some empirical support for Dewey's observation. I once had a
citation for this study but have lost it. I would love to be able to use this
in my own preservice teacher ed course, so I would be very grateful to anyone
who might be able to direct me to the original.

Centers-based education and Project Approach are very important to early
childhood education and many ECE texts deal with pros and cons of various room
arrangements. One I use with practicing teachers as well as preservice is in a
spiral bound book that the Missouri Department of Ed uses in its Project
Construct training. I don't have the reference at hand, but it has an article
by a teacher who changed from traditional teaching in a traditional classroom
to a more constructivist approach, and she shows her progress through year 1 to
year 2 to year 3 using floor plans.

One of the best sources of information about the physical environmental
affordances for teaching-learning practices is Gary T. Moore at the University
of Wisconsin at Milwaukee. He has doctorates in architecture and in
developmental psychology and heads up the Children's Environmental Research and
Design Group at UWM. The last email address I had for him was gtmoore who-is-at uwm.edu.

I hope you post any off-list answers you get back here on xmca!

Linda May Fitzgerald
Asst. Prof. of Early Childhood Education
College of Education
University of Northern Iowa
630 Schindler Education Center
Cedar Falls, Iowa 50614-0606
Phone: 319-273-2214 Fax: 319-273-5886
Email: FITZGERALD who-is-at UNI.EDU