Weird school layout

[LorenzoCalzone]

I went to visit a primary school and its layout completely put me off.

It was a single story building. Built in a octagon shape, with each classroom connected to the next, no corridor. Each classroom had a door to the outside. There was a non functional tiny courtyard in the middle, where a few plants were growing, but no space to make use of.

When I was shown round I was taken through each classroom in order to work my way round the building. So each poor teacher had to tell the kids to concentrate on her at the front of the room.

It seemed so odd and disruptive. The headteacher put the nail in the coffin by seeming shocked when I said I was a single parent. All in all the whole visit had a dreamlike quality.

Anyone else seen a school with such a layout?

I’ve seen hen and chicken classrooms. One big one with satellite rooms off it. DD was in one. 66 YR in her day. But, loads of space for activities and the quiet rooms were reading, writing and maths work.

I’ve not seen a whole school with continuous work spaces but DDs junior school had small classrooms joined by a very wide “corridor” that was actually a work space. Each area served 3 classrooms so dc worked in classroom and free flow space.

At my Primary school, every single class was connected. Single storey building in a rectangle shape and the classrooms went right around the outside of 3 sides of the building, with connecting doors between each.

However, the space in the middle was a large hall. So whilst you could technically get from Nursery to Y6 by going through every connecting door, each class also had it's own door to the hall.

I went to an old 3 storey victorian school building, with bell tower etc, so it couldn't have been more different from my vision of a school.

My DC current school is quite modern, single storey, but pretty standard with corridors leading to classrooms.

@LorenzoCalzone Teachers in any classroom will know dc might be disrupted by visitors. It doesn’t matter how they get into the classroom, it’s just the intrigue of a visitor.

A lot of 60s/70s primary schools are sort of like that but the middle bit is usually the hall. Mine was (I went in the 80s).
Generally though nobody moved around much unless it was a whole class moving to a PE lesson or something.
I remember sometimes you might be sent to give a message to another teacher and you'd either cut across the hall if it wasn't being used for a PE lesson or go around the outside the building.
If the weather was terrible you could cut through the classrooms but it didn't happen very often.
@LorenzoCalzone does the school not have a hall though?

I didn't see a hall, but it must have one. I think there might have been a big extension near the entrance where it could have been. So it's not in the centre like you'd expect.

That's true about all disruptions being equal!

@LorenzoCalzone I’m surprised you were not shown the hall. Does it have dining space? Where my DDs went, kitchens had been removed and dining areas repurposed. As a result we had big libraries and spaces for music lessons. Kitchen spaces repurposed too. Most schools can make space work but hopefully you have outside space too.

I did teaching practice in one similar but the eight classrooms were all off a central “ hub” and were all open plan! It was a nightmare, so noisy and chaotic. Hated it!