1. Spaces for Knowledge
Generation: A Framework
for Designing Student
Learning Environments
Professor Mike Keppell
Executive Director
Australian Digital Futures Institute
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2. Overview
‣ What are the trends and challenges we need
to consider?
‣ What are ‘spaces for knowledge generation’?
‣ What is a framework for designing student
learning environments?
‣ How do we meet student needs and improve
the learning environment?
‣ What design principles are useful for learning
space design?
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3. What are the trends and
challenges we need to consider?
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4. CSIRO Megatrends
On the move
Personalisation
IWorld
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5. University of the Future
n Democratisation of
knowledge and access
n Contestability of markets
and funding
n Digital technologies
n Global mobility
n Integration with industry
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7. Trends
‣ People expect to be able to work, learn, and
study whenever and wherever they want.
‣ The abundance of resources and
relationships will challenge our educational
identity.
‣ Students want to use their own technology
for learning.
‣ Shift across all sectors to online learning,
hybrid learning and collaborative models.
‣
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8. Challenges
n Seamless learning – people expect to be
able to work, learn, and study whenever
and wherever they want.
n Digital literacies – capabilities which fit an
individual for living, learning and working in a
digital society (JISC)
n Personalisation - our learning, teaching,
place of learning, technologies will be
individualised
n Digital scholarship will be the norm.
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9. What are spaces for knowledge
generation?
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10. Spaces for Knowledge
Generation
n Physical, blended or virtual ‘areas’ that:
n enhance learning
n that motivate learners
n promote authentic learning interactions
n Spaces where both teachers and students
optimize the perceived and actual
affordances of the space (Keppell &
Riddle, 2012).
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11. What is a framework for designing
student learning environments?
Distributed Seamless
Learning Learning
Spaces
Principles
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12. Distributed Spaces
n Growing acceptance that learning occurs in
different ‘places’
n Ubiquity of learning in a wide range of
contexts (Lea & Nicholl, 2002).
n Growing acceptance of life-long and life-
wide learning also have a major influence on
distributed learning spaces.
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13. Distributed
Learning Spaces
Physical Blended Virtual
Formal Informal Formal Informal
Mobile Personal Academic
Professional
Outdoor
Practice
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14. Distributed Learning
Spaces
n Book Chapter: http://
www.slideshare.net/
mkeppell/distributed-
spaces-for-learning
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15. Seamless Learning
n Focuses on the
continuity of the
learning journey
n Different places and
spaces
n Diverse technologies
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17. Seven Principles of
Learning Space Design
n The SKG project has established seven principles of
learning space design which support a collaborative
and student-centred approach to learning:
n Comfort: a space which creates a physical and
mental sense of ease and well-being
n Aesthetics: pleasure which includes the
recognition of symmetry, harmony, simplicity and
fitness for purpose
n Flow: the state of mind felt by the learner when
totally involved in the learning experience
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18. Seven Principles of
Learning Space Design
•Equity: consideration of the needs of cultural and
physical differences
•Blending: a mixture of technological and face-to-face
pedagogical resources
•Affordances: the “action possibilities” the learning
environment provides the users, including such things as
kitchens, natural light, wifi, private spaces, writing
surfaces, sofas, and so on.
•Repurposing: the potential for multiple usage of a
space (Souter, Riddle, Keppell, 2010) (http://
www.skgproject.com)
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28. Outdoor Learning Spaces
These pathways, thoroughfares
and occasional rest areas are
generally given a functional
value in traffic management
and are more often than not
developed as an after thought
in campus design. As such the
thoroughfares and rest
areas are under valued (or
not recognized) as important
spaces for teaching and
learning (Rafferty, 2012).
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