THE USE OF THE SPACE IN THE CLASSROOM

By Fredy Alonso Roa

 

For years the classroom were static spaces with rows and a lines, it was due to the character of the classes in that time, where the teacher was a figure of control and the person in front of the students possessed all the knowledge, but the times have changed, and the knowledge is something that is public, and the students became active participants willing to share knowledge and experiences.

SENA learning environments have experienced many changes due to many reasons, eliminating walls, including working stations, sometimes avoiding the use of boards, among some other variations, but even though all this changes have good intentions we have witnessed that not all the decisions in this concern were the most appropriated. Anyway, in this moment the most important is to remember, what the character of our learning sessions is, and also the new competences that our apprentices must develop such as collaborative work, problem solving abilities, interaction and autonomous learning, where the student is the center of the process.

Taking those aspects into account we must be aware of the classroom setting, the experience given by the latest times has shown that the spaces that are too static become not convenient for a collaborative class. The option of having light chairs and tables to create multiple distributions in the classroom is something that can promote the interaction and a more adequate environment for the cooperative work. Pair work and team work is easier when the participants have the option of moving around or placing the chair face to face, also in the moment of socializing information or having forums, debates and panel discussions is more comfortable when the classroom can be set in a half moon or in two parallel rows. Even moments like a warm up or a wrap up can have more options with a nice classroom setting.

So let us separate from the old heavy tables and the precisely organized rows in the classroom, we can be able to see our classrooms in a totally different shape.