Moreland Hills Elementary School

Narratives

Architect Narrative

The Elementary School is a 125,000-square-foot building accommodating grades PK-5. The building enabled the district to combine two aging elementary schools into one well-planned and innovative learning environment.

INFLUENCE FROM AROUND THE WORLD
Planning for the 1,000-student school was a collaborative process involving educators from the school district, the board of education, parents, students, community members, and the design team. A commitment to creating a landmark school, designed to engage and inspire children, led to an unusually thorough research phase. The team explored current research in early childhood education, including the work of such visionary thinkers as Lillian Katz, John Dewey, Howard Gardner, Jean Piaget, Phillip Schlechty, and Louis Malaguzzi. The process involved several domestic and international school visits. Ten PK-2 teachers participated in a weeklong study program of Malaguzzi’s philosophy in Reggio Emilia, Italy.

Early steps also included a philosophy vision workshop, “Changing the Focus of Traditional Education for the Coming Millenium—Designing Engaging Work for Students,” by Dr. Phillip Schlechty. The committee worked with an educational facilities consultant to shape the educational vision and program development.

CONNECTING LEARNING AND THE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT
The school is part of a protected forest habitat, with fields, woods, streams, and wetlands. A pedestrian bridge through the woods serves as a symbolic crossing to the outside world, a unique connection between learning and the learning environment.

The building design emphasizes connections to the environment and focused on the use of natural daylight and other light sources that enhance learning. Expansive windows overlook the wooded setting and infuse the interior space with natural light. The interior serves as a backdrop for showcasing children’s work and features extensive display areas. Natural motifs include a neutral palette, dark stained woods, and a leaf design in the casework laminates.

FLEXIBLE PROGRAM AREAS
The school offers preschool, kindergarten, and first- and second-grade programs focusing on children’s individual skill levels. As students move to the intermediate level, teachers encourage a team identity. Classrooms have operable walls, allowing students to work in smaller and larger groups as appropriate while exploring an integrated curriculum. The interior supports instructional flexibility with a variety of spaces of different sizes, extensive casework arrangements, and selected loose furnishings.

The building supports advanced programs for children with special needs and gifted students. These programs take place in classroom settings or smaller, specialized environments. Labs and activity areas are available for tutoring and special projects.

The building includes two cafeterias separating upper and lower grade levels. The light-filled media center includes reference and instructional space, as well as soft seating areas. The Community Education and Recreation Department is housed within the school to support community and before/after-school programs.

Technology highlights include wireless network capabilities; a classroom audio enhancement system with infrared wireless technology; and security-based technology, including card access, cameras, and carefully designed access and visual control.

Sustainable design practices resulted in minimal disturbance to the woodland to take advantage of natural shading and reduce lawn areas; and the incorporation of drought-resistant landscape materials, native plantings, and wildlife natural food plantings. Yard waste is recycled on site.

Educator Narrative

Our new elementary building brings together students and staff from three different schools. This new grade level configuration has provided a wonderful opportunity to create a Culture of Quality (ten basics) for our school family — students, staff and parents.

During the year before our school opened, staff members identified to be a part of the new building spent time engaging in a dialogue about their hopes and vision for the new school. Staff talked at length about what they would see, hear and feel as they walked the halls of the new school. From this, with input from parents, our ten basics were developed as guiding principles for our school family. Written in child friendly language, these ten basics were shared with our children and parents this year and were posted throughout the building.

The design of our school was influenced by the most current educational research. Staff members with a variety of experiences and expertise dialogued with the architects and planners to include their insights into the creation of flexible learning environment that will enable us to meet the diverse needs of our student population. They looked into the thinking behind developmentally appropriate practices, multi-age groups, grade level looping, and instructional differentiation. They also explored the educational ideas of some of education’s best thinkers.

Community involvement plays a large part in the everyday life of our school community. Our 150 staff members work in partnership with between 100 — 200 parent volunteers who support students and staff throughout the building on a weekly basis. The community education and recreation department has offices and programs within the building and coordinates year-round educational enrichment, before and after school programs, and recreational activities for students and residents.

Just as parental involvement helps to connect students to their community, the school’s design connects students to the learning environment. The building reflects the environment’s powerful influence on how students construct understanding and meaning of their world and their own experiences, placing an emphasis on natural day lighting and other light sources which affect learning. Transparency, mirrors, and windows provide students with a variety of ways to view their environment, make connections, and stretch their thinking. The environment essentially becomes a backdrop, a neutral setting to emphasize the individual child’s displayed work.

Our new elementary school was designed based upon the latest thinking in safety and security. Security cameras monitor students and staff at all entrances and in numerous other key areas. We are able to secure all entrances during the day, controlling access to the building by buzzer and visual control from the front door.

The continuous attention to nurturing a culture that empowers and celebrates success, collaboration, and state-of-the-art instruction is the beacon which identifies our elementary environment as a standard bearer. Our students and staff are provided with a myriad of opportunities to be reflective, cooperative, and collaboratively explore thinking and research. As a result, we are able to co-construct an elementary school experience which is an unmatched model for lifelong learning.