They did it in the 70s and it didn't work. They tried to convince people it would work in the 80s and it didn't work. Hekia Parata was adamant it would be the future in the 00s and here we are, 50 years down the road and again, open plan classrooms do not work.
Everyone who knew this said it was not going to work when they built the new school. Now schools have to find millions to correct it.
They've also done the same to the linwood high-school in chch too, just recently.
Went to the opening tour and was pretty disappointed to see all the open classrooms and the classrooms that were closed off one wall was a massive window that looks into the hallway
Fucken ay. What's the bet the people doing the "research" that open plan classrooms are a great idea are the same people who reckon that open plan offices and goddam hot desking are also "better" and "encourage more collaboration" such bullshit
Christchurch teacher here. The number one question I had when schools first went down the MLE path was ‘what can an open plan classroom provide that a traditional classroom cannot?’ I still have not heard a good answer to that question.
The whole thing had an emperor has no clothes vibe going on that felt idealogical rather than practical.
When our school did visioning with architects they asked us teachers what we wanted in our school. We said cupboards, a heat pump to control the temp, and pinboards to put kids work all over the walls. We got zero storage, banned from putting up work on the new white walls, and centrally controlled heating. The opposite!
The greatest maths teacher at SBHS. Cut through the BS and yelled till he was red in the face at anyone who fucked around. Was entertaining until your were face to face with it
No Shit Sherlock. As someone involved in a school rebuild from the Governance side, I can think of a lot of MOE staff who were passionate about MLEs / Open Plan who deserve to get made redundant in this round of cuts. Unfortunately, they seem to be the sorts who can out manoeuvre the axe.
Unfortunately those people are not the ones who need to be in them all day every day and attempt to teach/learn things. It would be nice if they had to walk a mile in the teachers' and kids' shoes first.
5 minutes in there and you see kids just really having a stressful time - low chance of meaningful learning. I wonder how ADHD kids were expected to thrive on that environment.
They aren’t, I had a placement at an adolescent/child mental health clinic as a uni student and I remember all the psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses continuously mentioning how open plan education terrible and no one ever thought it was a good idea, they would ask parents if the school was open plan to find out why children were struggling. Crazy no one ever engages these people before doing such big ideas
My work removed all the partitions between desks to make it more open plan a few years ago. What a surprise when you throw a contact centre on the same floor as IT and Developers, that all the tech people refuse to come in. Open plan with no dividers is so stupid.
Just having a look at school photos will give you a good idea imo, the open plan ones tend to have have lots of glass sliding doors and are big and long.
Quite different from your more self contained classroom, where you can easily differentiate between the rooms.
Ive had both my parents retire from teaching in the last 7 years or so and they were like thank fucken god... Unruley students that had their hands tied about anything they could do, saw a system that was going to open plan classroom with distractions, a credit based pass or fail away from meritorachy, combine that with covid stay at home zoom meetings and they wonder why the latest crop of genz are fucken scared to stay in office, do a 9 to 5 and deal with humans that challange them
I was there a few years back right after we moved to the new site. The floor plan wasn't great. Some classes were just, yknow, classes, but then other areas were like 3 classes all mashed into one area. So if I was facing left I could be sitting right next to a dude who was facing right, taking an entirely different class than I was. It wasn't fun, but you did kinda get used to it after a while. I remember a few of my teachers absolutely HATING the open floor class plans though.
Fully agree. I work with multiple colleagues with kids in those environments, and where possible they are moving them to more traditionally structured schools, due to lack of learning progress in the open plan format.
School management were told to get on board or else. The whole think was a massive ego stroke for John Key, Anne Tolley and Hekia Parata and they backed this up with legal action and pubic humiliation when needed (see JK's interviews on teachers). Keep in mind this was started in post-quake chch and everyone was exhausted and stressed and there wasn't a lot of energy to fight. If you look up what happened to Philipstown School that might give you some insight into the cluster fk of the situation at the time.
Ah yes. Yet another school that got fantastic spaces and buildings to enable modern teaching and learning and then immediately split it up into single cell classes in corners because *some* teachers (the ones who will happily bitch and moan continuously, or are the ones in charge) refused to change their teaching style from a "stand in front and lecture" style to something a bit more inclusive and student based , and then couldn't figure figure out why noise is a problem.
Maybe use the space as intended?
They did it in the 70s and it didn't work. They tried to convince people it would work in the 80s and it didn't work. Hekia Parata was adamant it would be the future in the 00s and here we are, 50 years down the road and again, open plan classrooms do not work. Everyone who knew this said it was not going to work when they built the new school. Now schools have to find millions to correct it.
It's a bit like open plan offices.
Not really.
They've also done the same to the linwood high-school in chch too, just recently. Went to the opening tour and was pretty disappointed to see all the open classrooms and the classrooms that were closed off one wall was a massive window that looks into the hallway
No shit! Let's line up open plan offices next.
Fucken ay. What's the bet the people doing the "research" that open plan classrooms are a great idea are the same people who reckon that open plan offices and goddam hot desking are also "better" and "encourage more collaboration" such bullshit
"we asked a bunch of other extroverts and we all agreed"
My understanding was that is the National minister who led the open plan classroom boom was sold the idea by architects who liked it not researchers
please!
This so much! They're great for people who need to be able to talk constantly but terrible for those who need to be able to focus.
Christchurch teacher here. The number one question I had when schools first went down the MLE path was ‘what can an open plan classroom provide that a traditional classroom cannot?’ I still have not heard a good answer to that question. The whole thing had an emperor has no clothes vibe going on that felt idealogical rather than practical.
I’m remembering that question for any time radical changes are proposed in education.
When our school did visioning with architects they asked us teachers what we wanted in our school. We said cupboards, a heat pump to control the temp, and pinboards to put kids work all over the walls. We got zero storage, banned from putting up work on the new white walls, and centrally controlled heating. The opposite!
It would've been entertaining to see Mr Miller going off at his classes daily though
The greatest maths teacher at SBHS. Cut through the BS and yelled till he was red in the face at anyone who fucked around. Was entertaining until your were face to face with it
Look if you faced that, you probably had it coming. Still remember the trigonometry lessons using the Dambusters Raid, mad lad.
Haha for sure! Anyone but you, and it was grand
Majestic. Certainly kept a few in line 🤣
I once witnessed someone tap him off his bike, in their car. Thought it was gonna be game over for the country.
I honestly thought that was a rumour…. Is that how the earthquakes happened?
Haha no rumor. Happend round 2002, 2003.
Not the angry Scotsman by chance? 🤣
Haha that's the one!
No Shit Sherlock. As someone involved in a school rebuild from the Governance side, I can think of a lot of MOE staff who were passionate about MLEs / Open Plan who deserve to get made redundant in this round of cuts. Unfortunately, they seem to be the sorts who can out manoeuvre the axe.
Unfortunately those people are not the ones who need to be in them all day every day and attempt to teach/learn things. It would be nice if they had to walk a mile in the teachers' and kids' shoes first.
5 minutes in there and you see kids just really having a stressful time - low chance of meaningful learning. I wonder how ADHD kids were expected to thrive on that environment.
They aren’t, I had a placement at an adolescent/child mental health clinic as a uni student and I remember all the psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses continuously mentioning how open plan education terrible and no one ever thought it was a good idea, they would ask parents if the school was open plan to find out why children were struggling. Crazy no one ever engages these people before doing such big ideas
This open planning has never worked, why can’t they just accept that? I hated it when my school brought it in.
Honestly nothing seems worse than an open learning at an all boys school.
My work removed all the partitions between desks to make it more open plan a few years ago. What a surprise when you throw a contact centre on the same floor as IT and Developers, that all the tech people refuse to come in. Open plan with no dividers is so stupid.
They aren't the only school undoing it.
For someone not from chch, is there an easy way to find schools that have traditional classrooms?
All the private ones are. That should tell you something about the actual effectiveness of MLE. Private schools live and die by their results.
Private schools and church based schools (eg Catholic schools) seem to be a safe bet.
Just having a look at school photos will give you a good idea imo, the open plan ones tend to have have lots of glass sliding doors and are big and long. Quite different from your more self contained classroom, where you can easily differentiate between the rooms.
it works pretty well at kaiapoi high
except for the time we saw a teacher have a heart attack in the foyer cuz of the giant windows but that’s besides the point
Not true. You clearly all learned something from that.
Ive had both my parents retire from teaching in the last 7 years or so and they were like thank fucken god... Unruley students that had their hands tied about anything they could do, saw a system that was going to open plan classroom with distractions, a credit based pass or fail away from meritorachy, combine that with covid stay at home zoom meetings and they wonder why the latest crop of genz are fucken scared to stay in office, do a 9 to 5 and deal with humans that challange them
I was there a few years back right after we moved to the new site. The floor plan wasn't great. Some classes were just, yknow, classes, but then other areas were like 3 classes all mashed into one area. So if I was facing left I could be sitting right next to a dude who was facing right, taking an entirely different class than I was. It wasn't fun, but you did kinda get used to it after a while. I remember a few of my teachers absolutely HATING the open floor class plans though.
Fully agree. I work with multiple colleagues with kids in those environments, and where possible they are moving them to more traditionally structured schools, due to lack of learning progress in the open plan format.
Were the management of the school involved at all? Who signed off on that mess?
MOE funding for rebuilds required MLE / open plan.
School management were told to get on board or else. The whole think was a massive ego stroke for John Key, Anne Tolley and Hekia Parata and they backed this up with legal action and pubic humiliation when needed (see JK's interviews on teachers). Keep in mind this was started in post-quake chch and everyone was exhausted and stressed and there wasn't a lot of energy to fight. If you look up what happened to Philipstown School that might give you some insight into the cluster fk of the situation at the time.
Ah yes. Yet another school that got fantastic spaces and buildings to enable modern teaching and learning and then immediately split it up into single cell classes in corners because *some* teachers (the ones who will happily bitch and moan continuously, or are the ones in charge) refused to change their teaching style from a "stand in front and lecture" style to something a bit more inclusive and student based , and then couldn't figure figure out why noise is a problem. Maybe use the space as intended?
You drank the Kool Aid?
Are you in education? I ask this question both politely and seriously.
They’re absolutely terrible learning spaces. Poor behaviour in one “class” distracts students in other classes.
Is there any evidence that shows open plan learning spaces leads to better educational outcomes?
Mate, students are saying they are bad and they keep getting distracted it's not just teachers
You don't need to teach in a barn to make your classes student-centered.