Instead of receiving instructional content in class (that is, a lecture), and completing assignment work for homework, some teachers facilitate instructional content online for students to engage with before class. This has become known as the ‘flipped classroom’ or ‘flipped learning’. Students come to class ready to participate in a range of interactive and often collaborative activities.

Blended learning combines the best of face-to-face learning with the best of online learning. This has resulted in greater emphasis on technology across campus, for example, digital infrastructure within classrooms and libraries, campus saturation of WI-FI, cloud-based software to the emergence of intuitive software.

The emergence of these new pedagogies has resulted in a reconceptualization of the university classroom and a new matrix of campus spaces. Tutorials & seminar rooms are being redesigned and branded as ‘active classrooms’ to enable greater flexibility and greater choice of learning activities. Early studies indicate better student outcomes when engaging in active learning.

Informal learning spaces are being located in close proximity to active classrooms, to enable a continuum of learning from pre-class to in-class and post-class. Learning conversations and experiences extend beyond the classroom threshold.

Flipped Classrooms

The concept of a ‘flipped classroom’ began as an empty box, with mobile tables and chairs. The idea was to embed all of the resources and technologies around the perimeter walls, including docking points for each table setting. The learning activities enabled in the room are:

• collaborative or independent tasks
• other students can join another table to foster cross-group interaction
• each group can access technology
• each group can access writeable surfaces
• each group can work on a horizontal surface
• access to retreat spaces
• two tables can join together to form groups of 12 students
• all furniture can be easily reconfigured or removed altogether for events and social activities
• Each table setting was designed for six people, with access to a wall mounted screen, multiple power points for students to plug their devices into, and glass writeable surfaces. Tables were deliberately left free of encumbrances such as fixed PCs, to maximise the types of activities that could take place.
• Being able to see what other students in the room are doing is a critical characteristic of the flipped classroom, as it fosters curiosity and confidence. Students can see what other groups are working on, which can either validate their own direction or inspire curiosity as to why other groups are doing something different.

Informal Learning

The adjacency of informal learning spaces has become synonymous with new generation learning environments in the last fifteen years. With an increase in collaborative learning throughout many higher education programs, universities recognise that students need places where they can study, research and produce collaborative content.

The proximity of Informal learning spaces adjacent formal classrooms promotes learning energy that commences before and/or after the timetabled event.

A variety of student activities need to be factored into the design of an informal learning space, from individual quiet study to small and medium sized groups with optional access to technologies. While some spaces can be quite noisy with collaborative study, students often moderate their own behaviour by undertaking quieter work in the lead up to exams.