“We really look after this space because we value it.”
Desborough College Student
A dynamic space designed to enable blended STEM learning
One school seizing this gauntlet is Desborough College, an ambitious and high-achieving secondary academy in Maidenhead, whose ethos encourages its students to enjoy, compete and achieve, both inside and outside the classroom. Desborough’s approach to STEM is to blend science, technology, engineering and maths to enable students to apply scientific methods to everyday life. Desborough students learn computational thinking and focus on real world applications of problem solving.
A standard school science lab doesn’t easily lend itself to this highly engaging style of learning, so head of DT and STEM leader, Aine Kelleher, took matters into her own hands. A disused food tech room was ripe for reinvention so, after winning a grant from local education trust, The Spoore, Merry and Rixman foundation, the school contacted Spaceoasis® to help them transform it into The SMR Innovation Centre. From floor to ceiling we completely refurbished the entire space, working with the existing architecture to deliver a zoned STEM learning space agile enough to adapt to a wide variety of tasks and learning styles.
Four zones designed to support different learning tasks
This innovative space consists of four key learning zones, with colour-coded floors to define the areas, each designed to enable different types of learning:
Collaborate: a space where learners can work together in small or larger groups
Explore: a space designed to encourages experimentation and exploration with easy access to resources
Gather: when the whole class needs to focus on the same thing, for giving instruction, whole class discussion, presentation and debate
Reflect: a quiet space to gather your thoughts and reflect on your learning
The Collaborate Zone
With dry-wipe LearningSurface® walls on three sides, a large central LearningSurface® table with ceiling-mounted projector above (which can project content from devices onto the table’s surface) and Lobe stools upholstered in vinyl, this is a space where students can work together in small or larger groups.
Although open to the rest of the studio on one side, this ‘nook’ has walls on three sides creating an immersive environment, perfect for brainstorms and problem-solving. The LearningSurface® dry-wipe table and walls enable students to sketch and scribe their thoughts and ideas, while the projector facilitates access to any content they may need.
The Explore Zone
This area is designed for hands-on, practical discovery and experimentation. With colour-coded storage and plenty of workbench space, students could use this area for building robots, trying out some ideas, building prototypes or experimenting.
The Gather Zone
This space is perfect for gathering groups for presentation, instruction or discussion. The varied height seating of the Seminario seating pod (with upholstered seating and tables on the inside and high stools around the outer touchdown) means everyone can see so the speaker doesn’t have to shout to hold their audience’s attention.
In front of the Seminario pod is a fixed presentation wall with an LCD screen that means the blinds can be kept open when the screen is in use to maintain light levels, making it easier for students to sustain concentration.
The Reflect Zone
A quiet space where students can go to think, work independently or have one-to-ones with their teacher. In the SMR Innovation Centre the Reflect zone was created out of an old store room and is furnished with upholstered Lobe stools and bench-style tables.
The four learning zones are complemented by mobile Bite tables and Lotus chairs, creating an agile environment that can be configured according to the task in hand.
STEM education is a topic of national importance
The importance of spaces like the SMR Innovation Centre was given the official nod when then-Prime Minister Theresa May visited in February 2018 and talked with students about cutting edge technology and its applications.
