Educational

BCPS Caravan of Gratitude

Welcome back to school! Starting an educator, administrator or office personnel position for the first time in a new district can be a challenge. Even coming back from Summer Break can be intimidating at times. This is why The Education Foundation of Baltimore County Public Schools created the Caravan of Gratitude.

What is a Caravan of Gratitude? It is a way to honor employees for their accomplishments as well as welcome new educators to Baltimore County Public Schools. To celebrate these new educators of 2022-23, the Education Foundation of BCPS made its first stop at the New Educators Orientation.

Douron had the pleasure of participating in this year’s Caravan of Gratitude on August 17 and 18 at Perry Hall High School. While lunch was provided, the new educators were presented with a variety of gifts from gift cards to school supplies and small classroom furniture to themed gift baskets including classroom decorations.

To learn more about the BCPS Caravan of Gratitude, click here.

Welcome students and teachers into schools with successful classroom design. Contact Douron.

Healthy Movement in the Classroom

If you’re of a certain age, chances are that you have a memory of a teacher telling you to sit still, stop fidgeting or something similar. After all, if you were moving around in your chair you must not have been paying attention, right? Wrong. Healthy movement in the classroom can be a good thing.

Research has confirmed that a moderate amount of movement actually helps to improve concentration and focus in the classroom. Looking at it from the other direction, sitting still does not mean paying attention … when we’re forced to be still we tend to wander mentally, become drowsy or both. This is true both in school and in professional settings, but it’s especially challenging for young people to keep still.

Children’s brains are still developing, and movement helps to refine the motor skills that lead to better coordination, which is directly linked to learning ability. Healthy movement encourages that development and helps keep kids more active and more alert, even if that movement happens while they’re seated.

So while part of the solution is to design a curriculum that allows for movement while out of their chairs, like getting out for walks or taking other breaks for physical activity, classroom design is increasingly allowing for movement while learning is happening, not as a separate activity.

This doesn’t necessarily mean having everyone rolling around on wheeled chairs (although rolling chairs are a great addition to a flexible classroom environment). Solutions can be as simple as providing seating with a footrest so kids can adjust their leg position. Chairs with adjustable height allow for changes in posture (and again are conducive to flexible classrooms). Other offerings include chairs that rock or bounce, or both, allowing a limited amount of movement but not enough to create a distraction from learning. Standing desks are another great option for healthy movement.

There’s no longer any doubt that movement helps learning rather than hindering it, so with any luck the days of those uncomfortable desk-bolted-to-the-chair classrooms are behind us.

Questions about classroom design for better learning? Contact Douron.

Classroom Design for STEM and STEAM Education

Over the past decade or so there’s been an increased focus on STEM education in America. There are several reasons for the trend, primary among them a continuing shortage of personnel for technology jobs, as well as the increased popularity of competitive robotics.

Even if students choose not to pursue a career in a technology field, a STEM curriculum teaches important skills like critical thinking, innovation and problem solving, and STEM concepts are now being incorporated into other educational disciplines as diverse as music and languages.

STEM, of course, stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. Sometimes “arts” is added to the equation, changing the acronym to STEAM. For our purposes, we’ll stick with STEM, because when it comes to classroom design the principles for arts and technological pursuits are very similar.

What are those principles? First, flexibility. A STEM curriculum is not a “sit still at your desk and learn” environment. Considering seating alone, students might need to stand, sit at desks, sit on stools, roll from one place to another on chairs, or flop on a comfy couch to collaborate, all in the same day.

To accommodate all that, both high and low desks/tables are desirable, and they should be able to easily reconfigure for different circumstances. Tables that taper front to back can be used individually or combined in a tight formation for group work (like pizza slices). Surfaces need to be especially durable, also, to stand up to paints and chemicals or the heat of a soldering iron.

Often overlooked in planning educational settings for STEM is the need for storage. STEM is more than just coding and classroom learning; there’s a lot of hands-on work, and projects that may span multiple days or weeks. Just as with art projects, there must be space to safely store this work in between sessions, clearing the room for the next group.

Finally, remember to plan for the technical requirements of a STEM classroom. As students embrace technology, the environment must do the same, and it’s impractical to demonstrate coding techniques on an old-school chalkboard. Requirements will vary according to the curriculum, but electronic whiteboards and projectors are often parts of the solution. And there should be plenty of outlets or power strips so students can charge and power their devices.

Flexibility, durability and technology are three of the main keys to designing a successful STEM (or STEAM) learning space. We’re here to help.

Back to School Tips for Educators & Teachers

Transitioning back to school or early childhood programs — or starting them for the first time— can create extra challenges during a pandemic. Learn what parents and teachers can do to help children make a successful transition to in-person learning and care.

For many families, the pandemic meant keeping their children at home to ensure social distancing and taking the necessary precautions. With more and more schools and programs opening up for in-person learning and care, this means that those children who stayed home will experience a new environment after a long break. For children who were born just before or during the COVID-19 pandemic, they may have stayed home rather than starting early childhood programs. This shift to in-person learning and care will be a brand new experience.

Dr. Karen Remley, Director of the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities provides tips and suggestions about how to push through these challenges of early childhood programs, or school in general, in the podcast below.

https://tools.cdc.gov/medialibrary/index.aspx#/media/id/424704

Douron has listened to your needs and want to help make the school furniture purchasing simple and easy for you. Here are some questions we have heard about the classroom design process:

What kinds of desks does a collaborative classroom need?
What kinds of desks does a knowledge transfer schoolroom need?
How can we make it easier for educators to use technology in their classrooms?

Here is a starting place for you to pick some quick options for school furniture.

If you have additional questions, please call us or email info@douron.com. We have the answers for 21^st Century classroom furnishings.

Learning Hubs and Media Centers

One of the many concerns over the effects of the pandemic on learning over these past two years has been the loss of opportunities for students to collaborate in person, important for both learning and the development of social skills. One of the ways these vital needs are being addressed is through the use of learning hubs and media centers, spaces that foster a combination of socialization and education. Let’s take a look at both.

Learning hubs, also called learning commons, are spaces for students to use either between classes or after school. In some cases these are off-site areas sponsored by local communities, but many are within school walls. Designed to be more inviting than simply hanging out in hallways or lobbies, learning hubs are flexible and adaptable to a variety of needs.

There are no hard and fast rules for learning hub design, but common items typically include soft and inviting furniture, with a layout that can be adapted to individual study or group collaboration. In some ways, learning hubs reflect trends we’ve seen in colleges, and in office design. Many have cafes with coffee or other drinks and light fare, tools like whiteboards to promote group work and private spaces for counseling, tutoring or quiet study. Some may even have outdoor areas.

While some schools have added learning hubs via new construction, many more are repurposing existing space, often unused or underused spaces like lobbies or cafeterias, which might normally be occupied for only a couple of hours per day.

The media center is an extension of the same concept, but with (as the name would suggest) a focus on the technology needed to produce graphic elements for projects and presentations. For that reason, media centers (also called library commons) are typically developed within existing libraries. The media center creates a hybrid space where new technology lives side by side with ready access to books and other more traditional sources of research.

As with learning hubs, look for lounge-style furniture designed for comfort, collaboration and flexibility, as well as the preservation of the private study spaces you’ll find in a traditional library. Check out some of our collaborative spaces at Wheaton High School here.

Student Well-Being in the Classroom

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought more than its share of challenges, to be sure. Even with all the changes forced upon businesses and the economic impact, few would argue that the greatest disruption has come in education. Parents and teachers alike continue to grapple with student well-being at any given time: in-person learning, remote learning or a combination of the two, and plans continue to change from week to week in many places.

There’s no single correct answer to what’s best for the well-being of our students, of course, and the physical presence of students will vary from place to place as guidelines are adjusted to the current situation. But there are some common threads that educators can turn to in order to help ensure student well-being to the greatest degree possible.

Ask. To get where you want to go, you need to know where you’re starting, and regularly checking in with students can help here. A few simple questions, ranging from “How are you feeling today?” to “How included did you feel in class today?” to “What made it harder to learn today?” can assist you in understanding your students’ emotional well-being and making sure you’re addressing the proper issues for them at any given time.

Be flexible. In the pre-COVID era we wrote repeatedly about the benefits of flexible education spaces. The challenges of the past two years have made flexibility even more desirable. Adaptable settings can help with physical distancing, accommodate hybrid situations where some students are joining remotely while others are in person, and – just as before the pandemic – encourage much greater engagement. Further, a flexible space can adapt to whatever the future might bring.

Move. Another thing that hasn’t changed is this: movement helps with learning, and with mental and physical development. To the greatest degree possible in an in-person setting, regular periods of movement should be scheduled. And for students learning from home, regular breaks (with encouragement to move around) will help with focus when they’re back in front of the webcam.

The irregular schedules brought about by the pandemic, and the need to sometimes re-teach forgotten material, leave our students at risk of falling behind. There’s no magic wand to fix the situation, but making sure students are emotionally ready to learn, and giving them appropriate spaces and time for movement, can go a long way.

Check out some of our classrooms that feature movement for student well-being here.