The Impact of School Environments: A Literature Review

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School Environment play a great role in the teaching-learning process. Numerous

evidence prove its positive and negative effect on the learning and development of students and

the comfort of the teaching staff in facilitating learning in the classroom. In this literature review,

school environment is mapped into four fields, namely, Systems and Processes, Products and

Services, Physical Environment, and Communication. Each field points out possible

environmental factors that affect student and teacher functioning and provides evidences

supported by research findings.

Classroom environment encompasses things such as buildings, furniture, and many

others that are directly and indirectly planned and constructed by people in various fields, aside

from educators. Most of the times, construction of these doesn’t involve the opinion of education

personnel, who are supposed to be the frontiers of such act since they are the agents of school

environmental changes. School environmental improvements must be driven by and specially

designed for the recipients of these changes, in such reason, students and teachers genuine

involvement should be supposedly evident. Moreover, sensitivity to environmental improvement

and considerations must be an exhibited by both neophytes and old-timers in the field of teaching.

I couldn’t agree more to the opinion of experts that environmental improvement must be

embedded in pedagogy, which in my humble opinion should also be incorporated with great

emphasis in teacher education.

School Improvement is not limited to the physical environment within the school grounds.

It also includes community involvement which may be actively practiced by countries abroad but

is minimal in ours. As much as community involvement is seen as both cause and effect of an

THE IMPACT OF SCHOOL ENVIRONMENTS LM ANDO

improved school, it could also be an avenue for students to render service to their community and

aid the ownership of both space, learning, and experience. Community partnerships should not

be among leaders only but must be felt among constituents and is exercised all year round, not

just during community immersions but even in students’ group studies and activities that involves

parental and community support.

Finally, the impact of school environment to students and teachers ranges greatly from

the effect of just simple uncomfort into a disruptive condition that is not conducive for learning,

stripping the child’s opportunity to participate and learn. Hence, policy makers must address

environmental problems more seriously and invest more in environmental changes.

THE IMPACT OF SCHOOL ENVIRONMENTS LM ANDO