Abstract
The educational project involving the design of a school yard using Google SketchUp, presented in this paper, was originally designed and implemented by undergraduate students at the Department of Primary Education of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (UoA) in the context of their studies in the “Teaching Geography with ICT†course. The aim of the project was to create awareness of spaces and their functions, and to redesign those spaces using Google Sketch up according to criteria relating both to the environment and the needs of pupils and their education. The assessment of this initiative, carried out by the undergraduate students during the pilot study showed that there is a distinct need for connecting real spaces with technology and for familiarity with the tools that help pupils visualise the space and that Google SketchUp could be an effective tool that is easily applied to this project and can enrich geography lessons for pupils in upper primary and lower secondary education.
Highlights
Space is a concept that has occupied the minds of specialists in science, philosophy, education and visual arts for a long time
The location chosen for carrying out and observing the project was the school yard at Marasleio School in Kolonaki, Athens. This was judged to be a convenient choice of space as some of the undergraduate students taught lessons or were carrying out their field work at Marasleio, so the space was familiar as well as being easy to access at various times of the day
A) Observation and recording of present situation: Students walked around the school yard of Marasleio School and mapped it, recording its spaces and what happens in each of them throughout the course of the day
Summary
Space is a concept that has occupied the minds of specialists in science, philosophy, education and visual arts for a long time. In spite of the dynamic relationship that links the child with the aforementioned units, and the child-centered educational theories, children‟s position in the choices affecting that space is still at a primitive level; children‟s bedrooms are chosen by their parents, the classroom is managed by the teacher, the school and its spaces are managed by the community Children experience these spaces as designed for them by adults, but without being consulted and they spend their school lives accepting the choices made by adults, at the end of their schooling they are expected to become active and responsible citizens. [1] [2] According to this theory, in order for young people to become active citizens they must be treated as such They must on the one hand be educated to affect and shape the circumstances in which they live, and on the other, investigate problems in their local environment through cooperative learning.
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