The country's educational system is known with its trend where each new education minister have the tendency to introduce a new learning method that they believed would improve education quality. However, there is still an existing issue with the accountability of the nation’s education system where its basic school curriculum, enforced by the central government – perpetually being set at a low academic level, which indirectly effects the outcome of the annual national examination, hence a visible increase in the number of students receiving exemplary grades - whereas in fact, the education system still fail in (1) teaching competency in basic learning skills and (2) promoting academic excellence for exceptional students.
The absence of direct exposure to dynamic learning experiences and engagement in the existing educational system is the issue with getting students interested in learning within the current education model. However, creating bridges between the formal and informal learning environments can connect the curricular worlds in which adolescents live and potentially establish a fresh environment that encourages involvement and interaction with others in the community as a whole.
“Majlis Ilmu” is a depiction of a perfect school environment that theoretically can provide an ideal design solution for Malaysia’s education structure in the future. A coalescence of (1) formal and (2) informal ways of learning is entailed to achieve this holistic learning experience. Informal environments allow formal spaces to flex and evolve, stimulating for deeper connection, more-artistic innovation, and limitless discovery that both enhance formal learning exchanges and encourage independent exploration and collaboration.
Bridging these ideologies and spaces can help students gain a deeper understanding of the conceptual knowledge (..in science, for example) by immediately and directly connecting it to their daily experiences in the real world.
As a result, students can take more responsibility for their learning while also making it apparent to teachers and peers. We believe that by making the learning process transparent to everyone, they would be able to build upon one another’s ideas and construct knowledge collectively.
Collage elements include;
Regular grid – Flat view – Rigidity - School utilities – Formal activities
Formal learning is a more structured learning experience that is presented in a methodical and deliberate manner. It offers a more traditional delivery method in which lessons are taught via textbooks and other educational materials, adding a level of immediate interactivity between learners-students.
Collage elements include;
Irregular grid – Perspective view – Flexibility – Break-out spaces - Informal activities
Informal learning gives students more control and flexibility in how they consume information because they can learn at their own pace and at any time - with anyone (mostly with their friends). C/v wants to push this narrative because we sometimes learn the most when we converse in these small corners - areas where we “lepak” – as this is when we’d have spontaneous discourses, creating a deeper learning/sharing experience.
Formally designed spaces will have the flexibility to be utilized informally if its amenities and atmosphere are conducive to learning. This ability to bridge the formal and informal learning environments has the potential to rigorously support students' interests and personal skill development.
This research aims to blur the line between formal and informal learning experiences by “informalizing the formal way of learning and formalizing the informal way of learning” to create a dynamic and productive learning environment.
To put this idea in built form, we can take Rolex Learning Centre by SANAA and Roskilde Festival Højskole by MVRDV as reference(s)..
The Rolex Learning Center is a radical and extremely experimental building built by the Japanese architectural firm SANAA, led by Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa, designed to produce new modes of study and engagement in the twenty-first century.
The building functioned as a single space and is placed almost in the centre of the site context for easy access for the surrounding facilities. The structure, which softly undulates, creates a sort of topographical landscape – and the created waves offer a huge amount of openness beneath the building, enabling visitors to walk underneath and approach the entrance hall placed in the building's centre.
Kazuyo Sejima of SANAA explained, transcripted in the book; Lives of the Artists, Lives of the Architects by Hans Ulrich Obrist.
MVRDV and Cobe collaborated on the design of a school in Roskilde – to be housed in a former concrete factory, which to host an ever-changing group of innovative start-ups as its main programme.
The ideals and values of the programme are inspired by volunteer engagement, humanistic focus, and creative power – the activities focus largely on active participation between students and teachers.
Interior spaces are designed to give a special informal learning environment energy that are arranged into three zones: some host pursuits of the mind, including writing, thinking, debate, and leadership; others are focused on students’ use of their bodies.
To quote from Archello..
In this project COBE and MVRDV renovated and opened the former factory hall up by adding large windows while preserving the existing concrete girders and pillars in their raw state as remnants of the former production hall, Hall 10. Throughout the building in its current state, one senses a clear contrast between new and old. The hall, which was originally a single open space, now houses 16 large boxes in different colours and materials inspired by the festival’s colourful universe. The boxes contain a variety of functions, such as workshops for the school’s artistic courses, stages, music studios, dance hall, classrooms, staff room and a lecture hall with a capacity of 150 people.
Each box is designed as a distinct space that provides an optimal setting for the students to engage in the different subjects. All the boxes address the large common room in the middle of the old production hall, which has a ceiling height of eight metres. This area also contains the school’s communal facilities, such as the dining hall and assembly hall. The boxes are stacked two high in a staggered formation that gives rise to interesting and intimate spaces where the school’s community can develop and thrive in the ‘space in between’.
Formal-informal learning environments can serve as a significantly effective strategies to foster engagement and understanding between the dynamics of content-students and teachers-students. For the reason that formal-informal collaborations will result in the formation of learning communities that will foster practises, dispositions, and understandings that will be useful and have its own value across various institutional settings and boundaries.
An accessible, authentic, and conceptually rich programs of the merged formal and informal learning environments can be the answer of an ideal learning environment to develop a better Malaysia.
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