Angelina Tsoukala - Portfolio: 2012

*a note on Steiner education: Steiner education system is academically equally recognised like the traditional schooling system, and is a rising trend in Europe over the past 80 years. It is different to the traditional education method in the way of teaching since Steiner educators believe that some parts of the brain advance in different stages than others, eg at the age of 6 when a child learns to write, in a Steiner institute the students learn how to get acquainted with their perception of 3D objects and the making of ED forms.

Key points of Steiner education adopted by SSS

- Take the child in consideration as a physical as well as an emotional entity. Understands students physical need for activity.

-Organisation skills are important to obtain. The organization of performances is a very important part of SSS.

-Learning to socialize is as important as any other kind of learning.

Teaching takes place in the South facing classrooms, and the teaching happens through story telling, by adopting cultural, historical and scientific elements. Where does film come in? The stories told in class are then organised in smaller or bigger productions by each class and presented to the local community and parents on the performance spaces that are located on the protection zone. Part of Steiner education is all about taking the physical needs of a child of that age very seriously, since children at that age is when they are more energetic and need to be physical for as long as possible. For this reason, all the performances are in the form of silent theater or miming, since it gives the students the opportunity to explore all types of physical movement since all the messages have to get accross to the audience through movement rathen than verbally.

Also a very big part of this school is about socialising, so the formation of the communal areas was very well thought of: For the lower school the communal area is a lot more playfull since children at the age of 6-10 still do not have any social awareness that they need to move through a space in specific ways like all adults do, so playfullness is encouraged all along. However, as it can be noticed, more private spaces are created within the overall communal area for smaller groups to socialize. The higher lower school area is more designed based on socialising in different ways than only playing, so there is open space for games, but also a lot of seating areas and a lot more private areas, since by the age of 14 groups will have formed and when entering teenagehood, the students will start seeking more privacy.

The central point of the school as it can be seen is the workshops and performance areas that are located in the protection zone. The reason why these functions were placed there is because making and performing are the most important aspects of Shoreham Steiner School, with the generator for the performances been the stories that take place in the classrooms been the second most important aspect and also socialising which comes in the communal area located on the north side of the classrooms. So basically, starting from the protection zone with the most important functions, the school spreads out towards the car park with the rest of the functions that are of less importance, ending up with the essential facilities, such as the reception.