Learning Spaces – The Long Read

Our brains have to work hard to learn new things. 

The forces building the knowledge bases inside our skulls (we’ll talk mainly about learning information and mental skills here, not more physical skills) need to find the right place and then attach new ideas and processes we bring to it its already complex architecture.  This is a tremendously difficult task as the systems already in place in our heads, even before we sit down to learn anything new are incredibly extensive and complex.

In the paragraphs that follow we’ll discuss the neuroscience-informed ways to create places for learning, regardless of age. 

Sometimes you’ll have a room with a door you can devote to learning and other times you’ll find yourself trying to learn, or trying to teach (great spaces for teaching are really the same as great places for learning) in a part of a much larger space.

Apply the information that follows as best you can based on your situation.

When you’re putting together a space where you or other people will learn or teach it’s useful to keep in mind the fact that there are all sorts of activities involved with learning, even if we focus just on learning more conceptual topics or developing cognitive skills (how to write a great marketing plan or principles of quantum physics or how to play the oboe and not physical ones, such as the calisthenics that filled way too many physical education class periods at school).

Sometimes students need to spend time alone with their minds, consolidating and really locking in what they’ve more recently been introduced to and other times they’re having conversations with teachers and other students and, during other sessions they are being instructed in a much more traditional way, in other words, actually being told things by teachers that they need to learn exactly as presented, such as how to conjugate Latin verbs (and students do still learn Latin, many students, most of whom do not ultimately take vows as Jesuits).

Different activities require different sorts of spaces, as we’ll talk about below.  Some requirements are consistent regardless of space, whether we’re talking about an area for solo reflection, hands on learning (for example, for engineering students), or art class for third graders.  Both individuals and groups learn best if the spaces that they’re in are not exposing them to audio or visual distractions, are neither too hot nor too cold (70 degrees Fahrenheit with 40 to 70% humidity is always best), and if they feel they have some control over the environments in which they find themselves (they can re-angle their chair relative to their desktop, slightly adjust the position of a window blind, etc.), more details on space similarity and differences follows.

You’ve probably heard that people learn better in spaces that are stuffed with natural light (no glare, please) and what you’ve heard is correct.  The single most important thing you can do for people who are learning, or teaching, is to open the drapes wide, pull up the blinds, dust off the skylight, etc.  Moving learning activities to a space with a window is a good idea, even if a few distractions might come with that move, such as a view of human activity through a window or a sight line from one part of a home into another where family members not in class may be playing.

Sunlight is the most powerful tool in an academic space designer, but an overdose doesn’t seem possible, as long as glare is not an issue and students can see screens.

Not all learning activities can possibly happen in natural light—some classes inevitably take place at night and others, for whatever reason, need to take place in spaces that lack windows to the outdoors.

When natural light is not an option, warm and cooler lights can be used effectively to keep learners learning and teachers teaching.  Warmer lights, those whose packages indicate that they produce relatively warm light, are best when people will be doing learning tasks that require creativity. Warmer bulbs are also desirable when people are going to be in relatively more contentious meetings with other students; so they work well for the student teams that never seem to work well or for teachers’ meetings where things are not expected to work well or for parent teacher conferences when there are likely to be real and significant differences of opinions about student progress, capabilities, and likelihood of acting mischievously.  Warm lights always work to their full potential when they are placed in tabletop or floor standing lamps.

If the learning situation doesn’t call for warm lights, turn them off and switch on the cooler ones instead, and their packages will tell you if they’re at the cooler end of the spectrum.  Cooler lights will encourage concentration, which can be tremendously handy as students struggle with a math assignment or something similar.  Cooler lights are always best used in overhead fixtures, located on ceilings or, if required, high on walls.

You’ve also probably heard that plants are great in classrooms, and neuroscience research, again confirms that what you’ve heard is indeed correct.  Plants are great in classrooms; they even seem to help students settle down for the hard task of learning when they’re only seen as learners are walking in to begin class but are behind students’ backs as lessons get underway.

The sorts of plants that you want to use in educational settings have curvy (i.e., not spikey) leaves and gracefully bending stems.  A green wall can work as long as it uses the right sorts of leaves and the plants are tightly packed together, so that the whole set of plants seems like a single mass of plants. The number of plants in view needs to be managed; this is one of those cases where more is definitely not better.  If a green wall a few yards high and wide is used in a class area that should be it for plants in a space.  If you’re using individual plants, you want to makes sure that at any one time students can only see one or two and that they’re no more than a yard or so tall.

All this research about plants aligns with research on biophilic design and also studies related to visual complexity.  Second things first.

Reduce the Stress – Reduce the Clutter

Study after study has shown that spaces that send lots of visual information to users, ones where there’s lots of visual clutter, regardless of age, make them feel stressed—and stress diverts mental energy from the learning process, so it’s definitely a no-no in any place you want people to learn or teach well.  Also, studies done in classrooms have shown that keeping visual clutter down while learning is particularly important.  When completed student assignments, inspirational quotes/images, art projects, etc., are all hung where students can see them while they’re supposed to be learning, those learning brains go into overdrive and stop doing much of anything well.  The goal in learning spaces, regardless of age, is moderate visual complexity, just like in this image below.  For more information on visual complexity and how to manage it, read this article.

Biophilic design is great in classrooms because it helps us keep in the relatively mellow mood that’s best for learning new things.  Learning makes us tense because it is hard and if we’re in a space that revs us up further we’re much more likely to fail at whatever we’re trying to do.  How can you incorporate biophilic principles into learning spaces:

• Work on tables/at desks with visible wood grain or install wooden floors or peal back the carpets to expose wooden floors, strip the paint from painted wood, add whatever visible wood grain you can, but keep the amount in view less than 50% of all surfaces.
• Make sure that something moves in the space that you’re in.A curtain in a slight breeze from a window, a hanging mobile in the current from a heating or air conditioning system or as people walk by, for example.
• Retreats that some of the students can use at least some of the time that give whomever sits in them a good view of whatever is happening nearby, all from a place where the person seated feels secure and protected, because their chair has a high, solid back, because they’re seat is edged into a niche in a wall, etc.  From time to time, anyone involved in the learning process should be able to tuck into a place where they feel safe and can keep track of what’s going on around them.

Back to Biophilia

Designing biophilicly helps students remain comfortable and to perform well but eventually people learning become mentally exhausted.  When they do, looking at something that’s what’s known in the psych biz as effortlessly fascinating is the goal.  When we do so, our stocks of mental energy build back up again. So, what is effortlessly fascinating to view?

• Nature scenes outdoors. This works out just fine when wherever people are learning is a structure in the middle of a meadow, for example, but for many of us and much of the time, we’re not in a building surrounded by beautiful nature.  If you’re so lucky as to have multiple nature view options, the best educational benefits will come from one that features gently rolling hills covered with grasses and occasional clumps of trees.  A few signs of humanity, like a winding country road or a distant barn are fine.  The effect of any view is greatly enhanced if there is some peaceful, quiet water visible, say a burbling brook or a tranquil lake.
• Whatever works live, as described in the last dot point, also works well in images or videos played in classrooms, and larger images are extra nice.
• Water! We are mentally refreshed by looking at fish swimming in aquariums and also water alone when it’s moving slowly, gently, say in a fountain or subdued water feature.   Research indicates that even seeing just a gentle fountain, with no plants present, is just as effective at restoring us to the mental states best for learning as looking at a lushly green view.  Just as seeing water is mentally revitalizing, so is looking into a fire;  fire is usually not an option in public spaces, or even many private ones.
• Hearing certain nature sounds, the sorts you might encounter in a meadow on a lovely Spring day—burbling brooks, gently rustling leaves and grasses, quietly calling birds, etc., is also refreshing—but they should be played quietly as a nearly imperceptible background hum.
• Looking at real live green leafy plants live is also mentally refreshing—but we’ve already convinced you to add plants to classrooms earlier in this report.

Colours

Learning is best in spaces with colours that are not very saturated but relatively bright, as illustrated here below.  Since seeing greens is tied to enhanced creative performance, a light wash or sage green or a sort of dusty pistachio can work well.  There are other colours that work here, however, lots of other colours.  There are slightly gray-ish light blues, peaches, and even purples, for example, that all meet the “not very saturated but relatively bright” objective.  If sometimes your students have trouble peacefully hanging out together, go for a warmer shade.  Don’t use red in learning environments, seeing it even briefly has been linked to degraded analytical performance, and it signals danger, a particularly negative connotation if you’re trying to instill a life-long respect for learning.

Memory 

A lot of learning is really remembering the right thing at the right time.

We remember things best in the same place where we initially learned them. We develop our own individualized learning-memory links as we study and they’re tied to particular sensory experiences we have as we learn.  When we again see what we were looking at as we learned something, or smell the same smell, etc., whatever we learned while looking at or smelling that thing comes more easily to mind.  Neuroscientists first started to pay attention to this effect when they realized how much better college students did on final exams when those tests were administered in the same room where classes were held than they did when those exams were scheduled for other rooms.

Classrooms must signal to users that learning will take place there and also that learning is valued.  Whole school buildings do this and so do dedicated zones in homes or in office buildings (where continuing education type classes might take place).  The sorts of signals to send differ from group to group.  It’s always a fine idea for educational spaces to be well maintained, for example, but from place to place or age group to age group the items needed to say “education is valued” may vary, and only a little snooping with user groups will turn up the messages of value.  For example, is a regular old write-on-wipe-off board OK or is a smart board that electronically records all that’s written on it required.  Could a retro chalk board work?  What about seats/desks and chairs?  Zoom technology to link students in different classrooms?  For young children (under age 6 or so), a home-ier sort of design will work best, but above that age kids can do well with a place that seems a little more academic and “business-like.”

Also, students need to feel that people like them belong in the classrooms developed.  If a space is packed with objects that screen male (as science fiction memorabilia has, at least in the past), females are unlikely to become engaged with educational programs there, for example.

Don’t forget that learning areas need to be comfortable places to spend time, even young backs can protest when the ergonomics of their seats don’t align with the forms of the creatures sitting in them.

 

Furniture arrangements can make it more or less likely that people will make eye contact with each other.  For discussion sessions, eye contact, facilitated by having all desks oriented to a single central point in a classroom (really, in some sort of ring), is best.  When more individual thinking, and no interactions with other students, are best, say during a presentation by a teacher, having all of the desks in a classroom face in the same direction, say toward a whiteboard at the front of a room, works well.  Spaces where furniture can be arranged for more or less eye contact add more space use options.  There is also some evidence that incorporating sit-stand desks into classrooms can support learning.

In any sort of educational centre, spaces for students to mingle are desirable and designing for mingling is discussed in this article.

Better Acoustics

Reverberation in learning spaces is very undesirable and background noises, such as sounds from other areas, particularly the sounds of people talking, should be kept to a minimum and slightly dampened by ambient white noise, as needed.

Fresh Air

Being able to open the windows to let in fresh air, when the air outside is fresh, is a learning boost, and so are well functioning, state of the art ventilation systems, particularly when their filters are cleaned regularly.

Positively designed learning environments recognize and respect neuroscience research on spaces where people process and utilize new information effectively.

Do email us any questions, we always love to hear from you.

Resources:

Peter Barrett, Alberto Treves, Tigran Shmis, Diego Ambasz, and Maria Ustinova.  2019. “The Impact of School Infrastructure on Learning:  A Synthesis of the Evidence.” The World Bank, Washington, DC, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329402892_The_Impact_of_School_…

Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.  2017.  “Schools for Health.” https://schools.forhealth.org