This paper presents a platform on which a new generation of applications targeted to aid the self-organised learner can be presented. The new application is enabled by innovations in trust-based security of data built upon emerging infrastructures to aid federated data access in the UK education sector. Within the proposed architecture, users and…

Due to architecture's complexity, it can be challenging to develop lessons for the students, and consequently, the teaching of architecture is frequently overlooked. Every community has an architectural history. For example, the community in which the author's students live has a variety of historic houses from when the community originated (the…

Describes how a teacher used his travel experiences in Iran as a basis for an art project with his fifth and sixth grade students--building a model Near Eastern village out of clay. (SJL)

The subject of gargoyles is engaging for children. Creating their own gargoyles is a journey to a place of fantasy and imagination. Ghosts, goblins, creatures of the night--this is the stuff for which students have a limitless reserve of energy. What more appropriate time than Halloween to share with them the history of these functional--and…

Describes a games-based instructional kit for elementary students on visual literacy, art vocabulary, and environmental design called "The Art Connection." The kit utilizes a teaching strategy called "See-Imagine-Do" which is further described in an article on pp13-17 of this issue. (SJL)

Plainfield, New Jersey has been a pathway from the Hudson to the Delaware Rivers for Native Americans, a settlement for early settlers, a source for industrial workers, and a residence for homeowners of a wide variety of incomes. The town's architecture recalls its social history. A need was seen to build community through recognition of the…

As a classroom teacher of art, the author questions the definitive ends that often accompany progressive enterprises in education. He questions the pressure he has experienced to reduce curricular possibilities and learning outcomes to the space of a single document. He argues that planning a learning outcome is "not" an architectural…

Draws on the principles of architect Frank Lloyd Wright and educator Maria Montessori to create a new genre of architectural design for schools--schools that nurture. Suggests that Montessori schools may develop their own architectural statement as they integrate indoors and outdoors with Montessori-specific requirements for the prepared…

Describes "Architecture and Children," a traveling exhibition which visually involves children in architectural principles and historic styles. States that it teaches children about architecture, and through architecture it instills the basis for aesthetic judgment. Argues that "children learn best by concrete examples of ideas, not…

The author's art instruction for young Egyptian children focuses on design, creative expression, and appreciation of Egypt's unique artistic tradition. This article is one of several in this issue on art education in other countries. (SJL)

Discusses "Students Discovering Cities" and related activities, explaining how the program evolved into a city planning project for fourth graders in West Jordan, Utah. Describes the final stage of the project in which students "built" their city inside the school gymnasium, complete with streets, lights, cardboard buildings,…

Discusses the benefits of teaching architecture to gifted students and describes a unit implemented in elementary gifted classrooms. Student activities included researching architects' styles, creating model-building exteriors out of mixed media, creating floor plans, designing interiors, and brainstorming with resource people from fields related…

Describes the use of puppet theater in an Alaskan elementary school focusing on the design and implementation of a play on the history of Alaska. Reports that the play's focus was on the change in architectural structures as a means to explore events that transformed Alaska. Provides recommendations for a similar project. (CMK)

Project offers grades 3-8 students hands-on design practice creating built environments to solve a society-based architectural problem. Students plan buildings, draw floor plans, and make scale models of the structures that are then used in related interdisciplinary activities. (Author)

Describes a local history project undertaken by fourth graders at Trumansburg Elementary School in Trumansburg, New York. Students studied the architecture of the village by visiting historical structures, sketching buildings, constructing three-dimensional models, and visiting a living history village. (MDM)