The physical environment (made up of two elements: the architectural facility and the arranged environment) where teaching takes place is often underrated as an influence on the quality of the learning process (Heimlich & Norland, 1994). Clearly, a comfortable and stimulating physical setting is a positive feature in any educational encounter (albeit never sufficient), but one that is usually only partially under the direct control of the teacher. In most situations, teachers have little influence over the architectural facility, but they do have some influence over the arrangement of the immediate environment of the classroom. For many literacy, numeracy and language teachers, the reality is that they are often simply grateful to have access to a venue with even a modicum of resources.
The architectural facilities where we observed the 15 teachers teaching varied considerably. At one extreme were the formal classrooms of the tertiary institutions, with their architecturally-designed environments and range of facilities available on-site – although even though one of these was near-new, it still had restricted access for one student in a wheelchair. At the other end of the spectrum, some teachers were working in cramped rooms in run-down buildings with poor light, bad ventilation and minimal facilities. Because several facilities were converted factory spaces, they are uncomfortably hot in summer and require extensive heating in winter.
One facility in particular had a distinctive (and positive) feel to it; this centrally-located community centre has been (re-)designed specifically as an LNL space (although still not fully completed). It exuded a sense of energy and purpose with a diversity of tutors and learners coming and going, considerable interaction in central areas such as corridors and a sense of acceptance and support emanating from these interactions. The fact that there was both a substantive physical and psychological presence to this facility contributed to this atmosphere. Other, less substantial, venues did not have a ‘presence’ comparable to this centre’s.
Despite the architectural limitations of many of the venues, the teachers had endeavoured to construct comfortable, welcoming teaching spaces for their learners, including sofas for informal seating, a pot-belly stove (badly needed in a setting open to cold southerlies) and students’ work on the walls as decoration. Many of the teaching rooms also had facilities available to make hot drinks and prepare food (students usually spent their breaks either in the teaching room or in nearby tea-rooms – with the inevitable exodus outside for the smokers). Some rooms were primarily designed for other purposes (tea-rooms and a board-room) meant that these spaces were occasionally subject to intrusions such as people coming in during teaching sessions to make cups of tea, although both learners and teachers appeared unperturbed by such intrusions.
One distinctive feature of literacy, numeracy and language teachers in these less permanent venues is their arrival for teaching carrying resource material (such as reference books, worksheets and teaching aids) and equipment (such as cookers for a cooking class) needed for the current teaching session. Several of the teachers commented on the anxiety generated by the need to bring the right material for the current session and how this sometimes limited their ability to divert on to additional topics because they did not have appropriate resources on hand.
Most of the teaching layouts were similar to the drawing shown below, where learner desks were arranged in a U shape facing a whiteboard with the teacher standing nearby during most of the teaching (apart from going round the learners individually when working on tasks). Teachers see this type of layout as non-hierarchical and most importantly, not formally arranged rows of desks – a formation that is perceived as intrinsically school-like.