Vertical School: Rethinking Children Learning Space for Dhaka City

Bangladesh University, Department of Architecture, Dhaka

Project idea

Dhaka is a very dense city. It is growing day by day. Density of Dhaka increasing rapidly, space constraint is the very most alarming problem for the city. We are unable to provide adequate space for any development in Dhaka city. Due to unplanned urban growth and space scarcity this problem is created. On the other hand, learning environment is the most prominent catalyst for children’s mental and physical growth. But our city is not capable to provide adequate space for healthy learning environment. That is why passive learning space of school such as play grounds, explore zone, experimental area, creative thinking, gathering and break out space are being lost day by day. The schools are often incorporated within a tiny flat or building. To meet-up the demand of large number of students, classrooms are trapped into multi-storied buildings. The schools are even in a small site without any play area and other learning areas related to child development. Our schools have failed to provide the classroom environment, internal breakout areas, creative class rooms, natural light and ventilation, acoustic consideration. As a result their overall development toward a successful citizen is greatly hampered. Turning this large population into a competitive human capital requires provision for proper learning spaces without any question.

Project description

So, what can we do now? Should we do something towards an agreement with the current difficulty? Or we keep making it worse day by day.
This hypothesis is all about the possible solution of this alarming problem. The vertical school with proper learning environment is the possible solution of the difficulty. The solution is focused on designing a school with the same small sites we get in our city, but have all of the required learning elements and proper learning environment. To house maximum number of students, combining different age groups in one perimeter & using the minimum required footprint was the main goals towards the journey.
School buildings and their learning environments have remained relatively static over time. The majority of our schools are decades old, and have not undergone a major redesign since they were originally built. These classrooms were built for traditional, “chalk-n-talk” modalities and passive learning—they are not prepared for today’s more active learning approaches.

The majority of the schools were designed as "cells and bells." Cells are the classrooms students inhabit until the bell rings, at which point they move on to another cell. This model for schools has been prevalent for over a century.
But what does the future of learning look like? If we apply principles from architecture, learning should be flexible, collaborative, sustainable, and filled with daylight.

In our rapidly changing world, today’s students need the knowledge, skills and dispositions to be successful in the complex future that awaits them. Specifically, 1) they must learn to work and thrive in an increasingly connected economy, and 2) they must solve problems, collaborate and create.
While the architecture of schools is not an answer to transformation in and of itself, school design holds huge potential for both creating and supporting the daily habits of successful schools. Not only are some spaces more inspiring and healthier to occupy, but simply investing in a space provides the messaging to kids that they matter. That they deserve a beautiful space to be in, because we care that they are learning and constantly improving.
We know that people learn differently from one another—so why do classrooms all look the same? In learner-driven + personalized spaces, the architecture supports collaboration among groups of students and educators, with plenty of space for inquiry and hands-on learning such as maker spaces, and lots of space for students to move around and be active.
Creating a space that can catalyze school transformation is not a one-size-fits-all solution; each school has its own goals and challenges that it must design for. However, the common refrain of a more “personalized,” healthy future for students helps us think about the broad needs of learners, and the specific spatial qualities that support that mindset shift.
Innovative school design isn’t simply about taking away walls and making spaces moveable; it’s about creating a variety of spaces that cater to specific learning needs, and providing a safe and healthy environment where kids feel valued. It’s about investing in healthy, environmentally-conscious schools that will inspire the future generation. School buildings and classroom spaces play a major role in the transition to the Future of Learning.
With so much effort going into changing teaching and learning practices, maybe it’s time to rethink how our physical school buildings need to change, too.


Site Selection:

To understand the average site area available in Dhaka city I have surveyed some schools of Dhanmondi and Mohammadpur area. There were three types of land given for the school. Type A- 0 bigha to 01 bigha, Type B- 2 bigha to 3.5 bigha and Type C- 4 bigha to 150 bigha. But those schools with 3.5 to 150 bigha were made minimum before 15 years when the condition of the city was not like today’s. So I found in present context of the city the Type B is the average of the land area for schools containing pre, primary and high school facilities.
As my proposal is for future development, so I have made a site hypothetically in reference to B type from my survey. The surrounding of the site is very dense as like we have now. The site area was 2.8 bigha which is very minimum and it was meant to create the challenge of designing the school with every desired requirement for proper learning environment in a very congested site and a very dense area.

Concept Formulation:
A child learns many things from the field. Team work, respect, honesty, leadership, discipline & creativity can be leant from the ground very well. Every international sport gives a child opportunity to learn these virtues and help them to be a good citizen in future. But in our city most of the schools failed to provide a field with enough space to play international sport.
So, the main idea was to accommodate the school facility in minimum needed footprint and use the rest of the site area as various play grounds. In the diagram there is shown that for various sizes of sites the school block remains the same but the field quantity and quality changes along with the variation of site size.
If the site size is very congested and no space available for ground then there will be play grounds within the school building itself.

Design Process:
From the beginning the target was to go for a modular solution so that it can be placed anywhere. The modular design gives us the flexibility in design. 50’x50’ Module accommodates 2 classrooms and a learning corridor of 14’. The module can be used in multiple ways to accommodate all functions as shown in the diagram. The target was not creating a narrow corridor only for circulation. Corridor is the most important place to learn outside the classroom. So I designed every corridor as a learning space which is precious enough for running, sitting, gossiping, reading, playing etc.

The main idea was to incorporate the breakout space and play areas along with the classrooms in every floor. The ground floor is used for entry court, central court, Admin, Guardian waiting and indoor games. The ground floor is semi open so the kids can run around and merge with the field. A guardian waiting was provided as because nowadays guardians wait outside of the school in the pedestrian and create an unwanted situation.
The classrooms for different age groups are divided horizontally along with teacher’s room, Labs, Breakout spaces and play areas. These play areas designed according to the standards of multisport courts law. The classrooms are well ventilated and oriented north south. The class rooms have natural lighting and controllable windows. The play areas and the breakout spaces can be used as library, prayer, Seminar, Festival spaces too.

Technical information

Master Plan, Diagrams, Sections, Plans