It was nice to see Class 3/4B again today after our last visit to the school two weeks ago. We also had a few boys from the Eco-design Team join this class today. Like the previous class, we listened to Ms. Roberts read the homework that the students had done to describe their favourite place in their house using the five senses. We also introduced them to the idea of 'site analysis' and why it is important to understand the place in which we are designing.
After a brief discussion, we went outside in three separate groups to find a site in the school grounds that might be a good place to locate a cubby. I had nine students in my group and to decide together which place we were going to go to, we stood in a circle and negotiated. Places were quickly ruled out as they were out of bounds, too busy with other activities like volleyball and basketball, or they had too many trees. We chose a spot on the edge of the oval, near the fence, where there was a reasonable gap in the trees and vegetation.
When we got there we realised that we only had about ten minutes and we had about five things to do. We quickly drew what we we could see on our site - the trees, the structure made of logs, the fence, the sky, the clouds, the grass. We wrote about the other senses - what could we smell, what could we taste, what could we hear, what could we feel. We then measured the site with a tape measure and learnt about millimetres, centimetres and metres. Our site was about 8 metres by 4 metres long. Finally, we discussed what we thought was good and bad about our site by writing a sentence that started with: "I think this is a good/bad spot for an Eco-Cubby because..."
Then we heard the other groups calling us to come back to the classroom. Each of the groups had done something slightly different. We found out that Ammon's class had even learnt how to convert between feet and millimetres!
Next week both classes will be developing the 'brief' and talking about the purpose or function of the Eco-Cubby. As homework they will be answering two questions - What do you want to do in the Eco-Cubby? and What do you want the experience of the Eco-Cubby to feel like?
For the first hour that we were at Clayton South Primary School today, we met with a new class - 3/4A! After quick introductions where we heard everyone's name and favourite colour, we spoke briefly about what an architect does. We then heard Mrs. Roberts read out the homework that everyone had done last week. They were asked to write about their favourite place at home using the 5 senses.
After that we started to talk about the idea of 'site analysis' and why we need to think about and understand the places that we are designing in. We talked about the differences between designing a cubby to be located in the middle of the oval as compared to building a cubby under a tree. As a group we discussed ideas of light/shade, building a roof to block out rain, hail, wind, and sun, and what some of the issues of building too close to a tree would be.
We then split up into three groups and went outside to find a spot in the school grounds that we could analyse. We talked about the five senses as we sat in our spots and we wrote a list of opportunities and constraints that the site had. We found that some places were too windy and too cold. Others were too sunny and not protected from any of the elements very much. Some were peaceful and comfortable amongst the trees and birds, while others were too close to trees. Some of the groups even measured their sites by pacing out their steps!
Yesterday we jumped on a train from Ballarat (we’ve been dog-sitting!) to make the long journey to Clayton South. We were very excited to meet our class of grade 3/4’s, visit the school grounds that Lynne (Principal) and Caroline (Sustainability teacher) had talked about, and meet the chickens that we had read about in their newsletter.
We decided to walk from the station to the school as we wanted to get a sense of the context and get to know the surrounding area. “This is paradise!”, Ammon remarked as I started to take photos of the culturally diverse mix of shops along Clayton Road. We didn’t see any buses coming, so we walked the whole way.
When we arrived at the school, we walked past the old heritage school with a very colourful art room and were greeted by Lynne who seemed very excited to see us there. She showed us around the school grounds – introducing us to the Hilton Chook House, the BER-rrrRR building and their large oval with beautiful trees. Then, all of a sudden, a classroom door was opened and we had fifteen wide-eyed 8- & 9-year olds staring at us!
We were told that we would just be observing the students for this visit, but the teachers threw us right in the deep end! We were brought ‘adult chairs’ as the students sat around us in a circle and we started introducing ourselves. Andrew, Charles, Hannah, Jazzie, Isabella, Aisha…. I couldn’t keep up with all the names, but we’ll get there!
They had so many questions for us: “What does your office look like?” “How many hours do you work a day?” “How old are you?” “When did you decide you wanted to be an architect?” “Do you do what your boss says?” “Do you do a lot of research?”… but they also had lots of answers for us too! We were very impressed.
Within the first ten minutes we had already heard some big words from the children – including “lightweight materials” when asked how we could make a cubby that was easily movable, the word “prototype” and its definition “it’s when you make a first test before you make the final product”, and that “eco” meant being friendly to the environment, not polluting the planet, and doing things like recycling materials.
They all seemed to understand what a scale model was and they easily identified some of the issues that might come up if you were to build a cubby out of cardboard (“it could break easily”, “rain would be an issue”, “it could get soggy”). I asked them how they could communicate their ideas to each other and to us as they designed their cubby – “writing”, “drawing”, “make a model”. We pushed them one step further and explained how Ammon was doing research on “participatory design” which meant he studied how people can design and make decisions together. How could we decide together which ideas we were going to use as a group?, he asked, to which they had lots of ideas:
“You could put two things together”, someone suggested.
Ms. Robert’s asked: “what’s a word that describes putting two things together?”
“Attach?” “Join?”
“You could take parts of one and mix it with another”, suggested another.
“What’s another word for that?”
“Combine?”
“Synthesize?” Ammon tested as they all sang out “ohhhh, we learned that last year in Mrs. ______’s class”
Jazzie shot up his hand and suggested, “People could talk together until they came to the same idea”
Wow! We already had understanding of the concepts of “workshopping” or “negotiation” - something we do as architects with our clients, community groups, users and staff every day.
We soon had to wrap up the conversation, but the students seemed like they wanted to keep going. There were still some hands up with burning questions. We asked them if they wanted “homework” and most of them said yes. Ammon challenged them with thinking about the word “ecological” and what that meant in terms of design. Straight away they raised their hands up with the answers – “it means you’re eco and you’re logical” some of them chanted. “So, you’re ecological!”, they chimed. Ammon told them that people could study this question for years, but he wanted them to think deeply about it and tell us next time.
I asked them to think about their favourite place the next time they were outside playing in the playground and to describe to us next time why that was their favourite place. Think about the five senses – sound, sight, smell, taste, touch. We are so excited to see what they come up with as they start to think in ecologies and about occupation, space and place.
One last burning question?
“Do you design and plan things for other people to build or do you build things too?”, Aisha asked. (We’re starting to remember their names by now!)
We told them how often architects design, plan and make drawings in an office for other people such as builders to construct things on site from. We also told them that our particular office, and we, Ammon and I, are interested in seeing people develop their capacities in many ways by learning how to hammer or drill or paint and that there are many skills that people can learn and DIY. We asked them if their mums or dads had made anything in their homes: “models”, “tables”, and “tissue box covers” came up. Hannah told us that her mum made her some shelves, she had painted them in many different colours by herself, and her dad had installed it on her wall for her.
Later, after the students had left for lunch, we were very excited to overhear Hannah saying to another student in the hallway – “I know what we can make our cubby out of…. we can use old shelves and paint them ourselves!”
We were beaming!
We are so very thrilled to be a part of Eco-Cubby and are very excited to continue this journey with our amazing students at Clayton South Primary School! We'll be seeing them fortnightly, so stay tuned for the next update!
x
Michelle + Ammon
