How would you assist students to integrate specialist knowledge into their design work and provide e

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Built Environment Education Annual Conference
BEECON 2006, London 12.09.06

• How would you assist students to integrate
  specialist knowledge into their design work and
  provide evidence of this within their portfolio?

Dr. Samer BagaeenDepartment of
ArchitectureUniversity of Strathclyde
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Christopher Alexander an urban analogy thinking
about city structure

• in A city is not a tree, Alexander argues
  both tree and semi-lattice are ways of
  thinking about how a large collection of many
  small systems goes to make up a large and complex
  system

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tree and semi-latticethe semi-lattice promotes
integration
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but to achieve integration, we need patience!

• in A pattern language, Alexander writes that
  patterns can never be designed or built in one
  fell swoop but patient piecemeal growth designed
  in such a way that every individual act is always
  helping to create or generate these larger global
  patterns

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so, where do we start?

• what we want to achieve is good discipline and
  management from below a bottom-up hierarchy has
  the structure needed for effectiveness and is
  easy to construct
• it was after all Alexander who suggested that
  large-scale forms could be synthesised after
  analysing large-scale problems into small
  problems so that they could be picked off one at
  a time

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HOWEVER, there will be difficulties

• the tree is accessible mentally and easy to deal
  with the semi-lattice is harder to deal with
  the aspects of overlap, ambiguity, and
  multiplicity of the semi-lattice are thicker,
  tougher, more subtle and more complex
• difficult to achieve the complexity of the
  semi-lattice in a single mental act

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one complex situation

• the study of architecture
• small systems forming a large complex system

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(No Transcript)
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• where the studio is the centre of the
  students educational life

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lets take for example one system / challenge in
the study of architecture

• for Building Technology and Environment
• how is specialist knowledge integrated into the
  studio?

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there are two aspects to this

• how to synthesise and design with this specialist
  knowledge?
• how to prove you have done it?
• the former is about the process
• the latter probably concerns how this knowledge
  is mapped clearly to ARB/RIBA criteria the
  manifestation and evidence

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a continuum of explicitness

• if a student does a technology module and is
  assessed on it, there is clear evidence of that
  specialist knowledge
• HOWEVER
• if the desire is for integration, the very act of
  separating it into a discrete module can be
  problematic and encourages a tick-box mentality
• ULTIMATELY
• architecture is about the whole, even if one must
  prove things in the portfolio individually

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issues to consider when moving forward

• think about both the ways in which courses may be
  structured (modules, learning outcomes, etc.) and
  how they are taught
• that is the balance between, on the one hand,
  the modularisation and therefore the
  explicitness of evidence, and on the other
  seamless integration made by encouraging ways of
  integrative thinking

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• its really about getting the balance right
• and promoting a way of thinking

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successful integration

• Student Personal Development Planning
• Year 1 Pilot, Department of Architecture
• Strathclyde University

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• because the majority of classes in the study
  of architecture are compulsory in alignment with
  ARB professional accreditation regulations, any
  additional tasks that the students needed to
  undertake regarding SPDP were minimal
• therefore, every effort was made to create an
  integrated network of activities to deliver SPDP
  objectives organically grown within and woven
  through the curriculum

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• classes in specific subject areas such as
  Architectural History and Theory, Building
  Technology and Environment, and Media and
  Communication, run in tandem with the studio
• in ever increasing efforts at integration, skills
  and knowledge gained in these classes are tested
  as applications within the studio
• with this process of creation and reflection,
  there is at the core of the students learning
  within the study of architecture a development of
  critical faculties with regard to their own work
• this self-critical context is suitably tempered
  to SPDP
• the SPDP process recognised this unique aspect of
  the study of architecture as a supportive
  backdrop to the tenets of SPDP, and stressed that
  its existing studio structure and culture already
  supported and embraced the process ambition of
  SPDP, and had existing tangible product from this
  process, vis a vis Progress File components, in
  the form of the portfolio and the sketchbook

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Dearings Progress File(the Dearing Report,
1997)

• the Progress File is the manifestation and
  evidence of personal development consisting of
  two elements
• A transcript
• A means by which students can monitor, build and
  reflect upon their personal development

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The Portfolio

• by its very nature the portfolio is reflective,
  and acts as definitive graphic evidence that the
  student has participated in a range of learning
  contexts at each stage and level of their
  programme
• the SPDP experience extended the remit of the
  architectural portfolio to the logical
  incorporation of SPDP objectives that all
  academic work, including class work be included
  in the students academic portfolio
• the physical portfolio became the physical
  embodiment of the students SPDP, including the
  students understanding of the process as much as
  outcome

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SPDP within the Department of Architecture at
Strathclyde

• SPDP has been introduced organically into the
  culture of the Department to consolidate
  established pedagogy
• it was not introduced as an additional credit but
  integrated seamlessly with existing coursework
  the Learning Enhancement Network at Strathclyde
  recommended embedding SPDP to the point of
  invisibility
• it was not perceived as a tick box exercise
  students were encouraged to embrace the benefits
  of SPDP as a voluntary act of self-awareness and
  life-long learning
• most important, SPDP in the Department was
  administered by a single member of staff, the
  SPDP Coordinator whose job was to plan, manage
  and coordinate

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• For SPDP to be successfully networked into
  all studios, classes, tutorials, etc it was
  critical that ALL STAFF
• buy into the common aspiration
• engage with the ambitions of integration
• are suitably inducted and supported while keeping
  additional responsibilities to a minimum
• to succeed, must have a system/network/semi-l
  attice and a manager in place the SPDP
  Coordinator

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thank you

• W http//www.strath.ac.uk/architecture/staff/bagae
  en.html
• W http//homepages.strath.ac.uk/cas04116/