Classroom without walls

I've written before about the idea of the classroom without walls. Today, with the sun shining down on the UK's warmest March in recorded history, my students and I sat in a classroom without walls - literally. We went outside and held our final teaching session of the term in the warm sun. The students enjoyed it, and frankly, so did I. It has been a very long time since I last conducted a lesson outside in the open air. I know this is not what I normally mean when I talk about classrooms without walls. Normally I'm alluding to the idea that with technology to mediate our communication, we can extend our traditional classroom boundaries to encompass learners across the globe. Through the use of webinars, videoconferencing, podcasting and even blogging, we can become global educators, and the tyranny of distance is overcome.

But today was the real deal. It was refreshing to just step away from all the artificial lighting, technology and classroom furniture and simply sit out on the grass, in the open air, learning from each other. It got me wondering what we actually do when we sit in a classroom, enclosed by four walls and with the door firmly closed. It tends to shut down learning, so that the world outside cannot witness what is happening in the room. Why do we shut the doors when we teach? Possibly to eliminate distractions, but there are so many distractions still in the room.

Today, in the warm sunshine, with nothing but blue sky above us, and with no power sockets, interactive whiteboards or computers in sight, the group listened intently, engaged completely, and spent two full hours focused on the task of putting together a research report. Often they are hunched over their computers, tapping away trying to make notes, or passing messages to each other on Facebook or Twitter. Today, all they had was a pad and pen to scribble their notes. Makes me wonder how learning could be transformed if we had warmer weather, and the outdoor learning movement had more influence than it currently enjoys.



Classrooms without walls by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at steve-wheeler.blogspot.com.