Teaching Architectural Design Studio Remotely: The Introduction to Architectural Design Course at METU

Abstract

This paper aims to briefly assess the potentials and limits of online learning environment for studio education by focusing on the case of 2019-20 spring semester studio of Introduction to Architectural Design course at Middle East Technical University’s Department of Architecture. As a transitory course between basic design principles and architectural design, Introduction to Architectural Design addresses the issues of site, program, structure, form, and material in reference to small scale architectural interventions. Reviewing the usual course of the semester until the COVID-19 outbreak as well as the effects of the unexpected switch to the emergency distance teaching, the paper highlights both the creative advantages and material shortcomings of the course’s adaptation process into the online studio format.

The Digitalization of Studio Practices and Its Impact on the Development of Design Literacy of First-Year Architecture Students

“…Over the last three years, within the framework of the conditions revealed by the COVID-19 pandemic, we experienced three different teaching/learning models at our respective design studios in the Bachelor of Architecture programmes at the Özyeğin University Department of Architecture and the Middle East Technical University (METU) Department of Architecture. First, we had to transform the face-to-face design education of the 2019 fall semester into "emergency remote teaching" (Asadpour, 2021;Green et al, 2020;Komez Daglioglu et al, 2020) for the spring term of 2020, and we continued in this way for three terms. Second, in the fall and spring semesters of 2021-2022, we physically returned to the campus: while some design studios returned to full face-to-face education, some studios con-Vol.16 Nr.5, 2023, Art.…”