Learning Landscape as a Structural and Functional Component of Formation of the Architecture of Nonformal Education Institutions

Abstract

The article analyzes views on the formation of the concepts of "educational environment" and "learning landscape" from the perspective of pedagogical science and from the perspective of architectural theory. The author's considerations regarding the interdisciplinary connection of these concepts are presented. The article presents also individual results of the author's research on the development of the architecture of non-formal education institutions (hereafter NFEI). The learning landscape (external space of the educational institution) was analyzed as a material structural and functional component to which the following processes correspond: a group of processes of communication and education (inner courtyards, atriums, squares in front of the main entrance, training grounds, experimental sites, operated roofs, etc.); recreational processes in this context is an important addition to the full functioning of the institution as an organism; the processes that provide the economic zone, parking and external communication space of the institution are essentially those that serve and are mandatory for the reproduction of other groups of processes. Of course, these processes and the architectural and landscape elements linked to them were analyzed complexly. The analysis of these processes should be carried out in accordance with the specific conditions of the location of the NFEI, taking into account external and internal factors of influence, local traditions, history and opinion of the community, and the main decisions regarding the formation of structural and functional models of such institutions should be taken already at the stage of development concepts formation. As an illustration of an architectural object that is harmoniously combined with its external space, the Community Centre Kastelli (Oulu, Finland) was given. Currently, it is rather difficult to give an unequivocal definition of the concept of "learning landscape", since there is a significant difference in the interpretation of this phenomenon in the pedagogical field and in the concept of landscape that is familiar to architects. Therefore, from the point of view of the architectural theory, namely in matters of formation of the architecture of new-type educational institutions (for example, NFEI), the following interpretation is proposed: "learning landscape" is a logical and consistent structural and functional component of an educational institution, as an object of architecture, which should be designed with the ability to dynamically develop in close connection with the architecture of the educational institution building and takes into account modern and predictive educational scenarios. At the same time, the "educational landscape" in the sense presented above is a necessary link of the subsystem of education, which expresses its educational and material component, is accessible to all segments of the population and must be meaningfully and objectively organized. In the structure of the conceptual apparatus of the socio-pedagogical phenomenon of the "educational environment" ("educational space", learning landscape), the architectural "learning landscape" is hierarchically subordinated to the latest and prognostic educational scenarios (the influence of external factors) and is a regular and dynamic structural and functional component of the conceptual, and further, the material manifestation of the formation of the educational institution's architecture.