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When planning lessons, teachers also plan about the layout of the classroom for the
day or particular lesson. Teachers therefore need to change furniture layout in a
classroom frequently. While planning a lesson teacher will ask the following questions
to him/herself: Can I see the faces of every single student and can they see me? Can
everyone see the board (if he/she is planning on using it)? Can the students see one
another? Can I move around the room so that I can monitor effectively? And comforts
of the students in the classroom.
This article discusses the various classroom layouts and its use, parameters to be
considered while designing/purchasing furniture for students comfort, furniture utility,
student performance, health risks of poorly designed furniture and need for frequent
change in classroom layout, standards for classroom furniture and availability of
properly designed furniture in India
Group seating is also better for doing group work, distributing materials, and
for better group interaction with the teacher. If possible teacher can also
change his/her desk around. Sometimes teacher may like to sit at the back of
the room, which brings a whole new perspective. Group seating arrangement is
also useful for revision classes, when teacher wants to form small groups with a
brighter student as the leader of the group and help others for completing the
task given and the teacher can monitor the performance through the group
leader.
Desks in Pairs: Pairs are tricky. They seem great from a teacher’s standpoint
since students have instant partners for activities, and the primary focus is still
on the teacher. Students are paired up with either students with similar
abilities, or students with opposite abilities, to complement and help one
another. This theory, however, is often detrimental to many students. Would a
student like to be paired up for the year with a lazy co-worker or a co-worker
who constantly outperforms the partner? Let’s face it; schools must teach
students to have tolerance and work together with many types of people, but in
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the real world, you are rarely forced to work continuously one-on-one with
someone who makes you feel uncomfortable or inferior. Putting students in this
stressful one-on-one situation may not be as kind as it seems.
Tables as Desks: Tables indicate large group activity. If the teacher expects a
silent classroom, do not sit students at tables. Tables are for interactive,
project-based classrooms where students spend much of the time
discussing, planning, and creating. You don’t need actual tables, either;
putting groups of desks together gives the same effect. Remember that
choosing a desk arrangement is never set in stone. Rethink arrangement
when your students need to refocus or when their learning styles on a
whole favor a different environment.
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However, apart from those along the
back, they also have to turn to see
whatever the teacher is presenting. If
the group is too large to get around a
U-shaped layout or a board-room table,
with concentric circles of students,
maximises the possibilities of
discussion. Clearly this works well
without tables, and it is useful to make
efforts to ensure that over several
sessions, everyone has their turn in the
"inner circle".
The arrangements of the class room have large effect on the students and the
lesson. Sometimes the teacher wants the focus of the students on him/her,
while at other times he/she wants them to work in groups or pairs. Teacher
wants to be in a position to move around the room easily and monitor the
whole class, and sometimes the students will have to walk around to get
materials or talk to other students. While the class strength is generally 40
during the examination only 24 students are permitted in each room. Thus
while creating a class room plan following steps need to be taken:
Children spend a large part of their times in the classroom. School age is a vital
period for child development. Regarding low back pain, sitting posture is the
most troublesome situation. Some studies showed that design of school
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furniture is one of the contributing factors to back pain among pupils (1).
Research has implicated that mismatch between school furniture and body size
may be regarded as a causative factor for musculoskeletal disorders amongst
pupils (2). For this reason, conducting a study to help develop appropriate
design strategies for school furniture design may be necessary, if such data are
not available.
In order to reach an optimal fitness between school furniture and the pupils,
the furniture should be designed according to psychophysical characteristics of
the users as well as educational environment specifications discussed earlier.
With more and more private schools established under the guise private is
more efficient, schools are becoming business enterprises where profit motto is
the main theme and the collection of anthropometrical data is considered
unproductive by many. Tables 1 and 2 provide a sample data for a private
school where children mainly from low and middle income group families study.
Table -1: Mean age of School Children (Years)
Grade Boys Girls
5th Standard 10 yrs 4mo 10 yrs 8mo
6th Standard 11 yrs5mo 11 yrs 8mo
7th Standard 12 yrs 5 mo 12 yrs 8 mo
8th Standard 13 yrs 5 mo 13 yrs 10 mo
9th Standard 14 yrs 6 mo 14 yrs 8 mo
10th Standard 15 yrs 6 mo 15 yrs 6 mo
Table – 2: Descriptive Statistics of height in School Boys and Girls (Low and – Middle
income Families)
Grade Boys Girls Remarks
Height Weight Height Weight
weight are only
actual heights
indicative and
Height and
Height and weight of children depends upon the nutritional status, and age.
Minakshi Agarwal in a study of nutritional status of rag pickers and slum
dwellers in age group of 8-14 years has compared the data with that of various
other researchers and national data provided by institutions like ICMR and
NNMB. The data is shown in table 3. The data provided by Vijayaraghavan and
Aggarwal and shown in column 2 and 5 in table 3 is for well to do and affluent
class children, whereas ICMR and NNMB data in column 3 and 4 in table – 3 is
for rural children. Furniture selection (Table – 4) can be made using such data
and furniture size as per ISO 5970 (ref Annexure for summary of dimensions as
per ISO 5970). Furniture designers can also make use of such data in the
absence of custom data from schools.
2.2 Sitting posture and Furniture design: The sitting postures of children
have been cause for great concern, and of disciplinary crises in schools. Erect
posture, or ‘sitting pretty,’ with a flexion of 90° at the hip joints and preserved
concavity at the small of the back (lordosis), has always been considered
‘correct’ posture, despite there being no basis for it in science. It is reported
that a forward inclination of the seat decreased the backward tilt of the pelvis
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and increased lumbar lordosis. The muscle activity of m. Erector Spinae also
decreased. A desk with a 10° inclination required less trunk and neck flexion.
However, hardly anyone can sit this way and work simultaneously for more
than one or two minutes. The reason is simply that normal people cannot bend
more than about 60° at the hip joints. When sitting upright, one need to bend
forward about 30° further in the lumbar region. When reading and writing, one
needs to bend an additional 30° to 40° just to be able to read normal text. This
results in a hunched-over position that strains the muscles and tendons of the
back and compresses the soft bones of the spine. This is the most likely cause
of backache among schoolchildren, and it often leads to chronic backache later
in life (Around 1870, German orthopedic surgeons recognized the problem and
attempted to construct a new style of school furniture that would enable pupils
to sit more upright, in such a way as to reduce tension and compression. In
1900, local German governments adopted the socalled Rettig-bank as the ideal
furniture for schoolchildren. The Rettig-bank was also adopted in many other
countries in the industrialized world).
The Rettig-banks were rather tall, of wooden construction, and with narrow
horizontal seats and sloping desktops. The seat and desktop were connected to
form a unit. The seats also featured lumbar support, which was considered the
most effective means of securing an upright sitting position. The feet could be
supported at three different levels, reducing the problem of dangling feet.
Normally the Rettig-banks were positioned in three to four long rows in the
classroom, and pupils were not allowed to move around with the heavy
furniture. Better posture could be achieved using furniture that is 15 to 20 cm
higher, with seats and desktops that sloped towards one another. This explains
why children typically find it far more comfortable to tilt forward on the front
legs of their chairs. By sitting with a more open angle in the hip joint, lumbar
lordosis is preserved, and pupils can sit in balance with a straight back similar
to a horse rider. To eliminate the problem of dangling feet, transverse bars like
those on the Rettig-bank were installed.
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Today’s furniture often uses the same clunky and unduly heavy
designs of the 1960s, preventing the easy reconfiguration of
classrooms as the learning situation requires. A teacher might want to
arrange desks in cooperative groups of four, and then switch to a U-shaped
configuration for the remainder of the class, but are prevented from easily
doing so by the furniture's weight.
Most teachers seem to associate learning with quiet, disciplined sitting. “They
are making concentration and cognitive attention dependent on physical
inertness” — the students’ need for physical relaxation, signalized by fidgeting
etc, is suppressed. “Movement is not desirable because it disturbs the class” —
Many adults still think the “ideal” student sits in class receptively, attentively
and motorically passive.
One need not worry about students which are rocking on their chairs. They’re
just carrying out their physical and mental survival. The commonly held opinion
that movement detracts from attention and concentration is no longer valid.
Movement is an anthropological need and a basic behaviour for adolescents to
support a well balanced physical, mental and emotional development. The
highly sensitive and changing organism of adolescents requires a lot of physical
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activity to supply growing organs, muscles and brain with blood, oxygen and
nutrients.
Today, people of all ages suffer from an ever increasing lack of exercise and a
sedentary lifestyle. Therefore these anthropological principles should no longer
be stymied by static-passive ergonomic standards but incorporated in “ergo-
dynamic” solutions which encourage dynamic and productive sitting as well as
temporary standing and active learning.
Only a continual rhythmic change between passivity and activity, strain and
relief, tension and relaxation will lead to conditions which ensure a balanced
physical, emotional and mental state. The physiological load shift is
automatically executed even while lying down and sleeping. This shift is
significantly more important in a physiologically adverse position such as
sitting. Therefore active-dynamic sitting is an important part of an “ergo-
dynamic” and healthy work station in school.
Active-dynamic sitting always includes active leg movement. Foot and leg
movements are physiologically important for two reasons. Not only do they
activate, they improve the blood circulation, but they also have a direct impact
on the position of the pelvis. The activity is determined by the seat’s mobility,
if, for example, the body teeters, rolls around or swivels on the chair. Consider
the problems passengers have in cramped seats on long flights or long
distance busses. Any intermittent movement of the legs has an effect on the
position and dynamics of the pelvis.
With the pelvis, the position of the sacrum and its base - on which the bottom
disk and therefore the entire spine rests - changes as well. This means that
every change in the pelvic position results in a corresponding activity of the
spinal column.
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As long as this active-dynamic balance exists, there is a natural strain and
relief on the muscles, sinews, ligaments, disks and vertebrae involved in
sitting. Moreover, a frequent load shift supports the demand for a muscle
controlled sitting (“sitting up”) because - in contrast to passive sitting in a
comfortable chair - the muscular endurance improves. As the posture changes,
there is always one group of muscle fibers at work to maintain the posture
while others can relax. The result is a symmetric muscle strain with a
coordinated agonistic and antagonistic muscle balance. This continual muscle
activity not only builds the muscles of the spine, it also supports its economical
supply.
Productive, dynamic sitting also supports diffusion in the disks because they
are no longer partially exposed to permanent pressure, but the pressure is
distributed over their entire surface.
Movement doesn’t only come from the head; movement also supports
the head
A child’s healthy brain will signal its need for a dynamic load shifts
unconsciously by rocking or fidgeting on conventional chairs. Neuro-scientific
findings confirm the hypotheses that physical activity and related
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psychological-emotional control processes are essential for cognitive
performance. A common proverb says: “The mind forms the body”, but what
about the body forming the mind? There have been studies confirming that
physical activity alone and its sensory effects develop, maintain and strengthen
synapses in the brain (Hollmann et al. 2005; Spitzer 2002).
• Can I see the faces of every single student and can they see me?
• Can everyone see the board (if you're planning on using it)?
• Can the students see one another?
• Can I move around the room so that I can monitor effectively?
The first question is really important. Teacher doesn’t necessarily know all the
students' names so it's vital to be able to see them all. Although it can seem
like an extra effort and a waste of time, spending the first two minutes of a
class moving the furniture so that teacher can see every single face is time well
invested. Teacher can get the students to help him/her and as long as he/she
gives the instructions in English it's all good language practice!
Choosing the right Classroom furniture: Many people may consider school
furniture to be somewhat of a trivial item. The fact of the matter is, choosing
the right school furniture that can actually make a large difference in the
overall productivity of the classroom.
The desks that you're going to choose are going to be among the most
important school furniture that is inside of the classroom. Allowing storage for
the student is very important, and you have several options that are available
for you, such as lift top and open end access. You should also make sure to size
the school desk according to the average size of the student that will be using
it.
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important piece of school furniture takes the size of the student into
consideration.
Finally, you want to make sure that you have plenty of storage available, both
for the students and for the teacher. This school furniture will help to keep
things out of the way and available at a moment’s notice in order to keep the
classroom flowing smoothly.
Since the days of Queen Victoria and Chancellor Bismarck, the sitting postures
of children have been cause for great concern, and of disciplinary crises in
schools and in private homes. Erect posture, or ‘sitting pretty,’ with a flexion of
90° at the hip joints and preserved concavity at the small of the back (lordosis),
has always been considered ‘correct’ posture, despite there being no basis for
it in science.
The truth is, hardly anyone can sit this way and work simultaneously for more
than one or two minutes. The reason is simply that normal people cannot bend
more than about 60° at the hip joints, which was demonstrated clearly by
Akerblom, Keegan, and Schoberth in x-ray photos about 50 years ago. When
sitting upright, one need to bend forward about 30° further in the lumbar
region. When reading and writing, one needs to bend an additional 30° to 40°
just to be able to read normal text. This results in a hunched-over position that
strains the muscles and tendons of the back and compresses the soft bones of
the spine. This is the most likely cause of backache among schoolchildren, and
it often leads to chronic backache later in life.
The Rettig-banks were rather tall, of wooden construction, and with narrow
horizontal seats and sloping desktops. The seat and desktop were connected to
form a unit. The seats also featured lumbar support, which was considered the
most effective means of securing an upright sitting position. The feet could be
supported at three different levels, reducing the problem of dangling feet.
Normally the Rettig-banks were positioned in three to four long rows in the
classroom, and pupils were not allowed to move around with the heavy
furniture.
Most standard School Higher furniture and seats Using 20 cm higher furniture
furniture today induces much and table sloping towards with about 15o Slope can give
harmful bending in the lower each other reduces the a posture almost as if
back when reading and bending standing or horse riding
writing
Since 1970, large-scale experiments have been done in Danish and Swedish
schools in an attempt to construct furniture that would enable pupils to sit with
better posture. It was found that better posture could be achieved using
furniture that was 15 to 20 cm higher, with seats and desktops that sloped
towards one another. This explains why children typically find it far more
comfortable to tilt forward on the front legs of their chairs. By sitting with a
more open angle in the hip joint, lumbar lordosis is preserved, and pupils can
sit in balance with a straight back similar to a horse rider. To eliminate the
problem of dangling feet, transverse bars like those on the Rettig-bank were
installed. The higher furniture allows pupils to move much more freely and use
a variety of working postures. (During the first weeks short instructions should
be given.) An added advantage is that abdominal respiration is much improved.
Several scientific studies have documented the positive effects of the tall
Scandinavian furniture on the postures and comfort of pupils, the results of
which have been published largely in Ergonomics.
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Correct height of furniture is Reading and writing position: Resting position: Move
important: Edge of desk at Use front half of the seat, backward on the seat. Use
level with your buttocks and both feet on the floor, desk the lumber support, Feet on
front edge of chair 2 – 4 cm top sloping foot rest
above knee
In 2001, the structural principles in the tall Scandinavian school furniture were
formally adopted as the dominant part of the new European pre- Standard for
School Furniture (Ref figure 3). However, better awareness is still needed, as a
range of options are included in the new standards.
ISO 5970 specifies basic functional sizes for seating and tables in educational
institutions and colour code to be followed (ref. Annexure). As per ISO 5970
school furniture is required to be colour coded based on furniture sizes
(Numbered) for easy identification of sizes so that user will easily identify which
size furniture will go where in the school.
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3.0 Availability of right type of school furniture in India: In India we
don’t have standards for school (Classroom) furniture yet. However the
furniture manufacturers have come out, inspired by the European designs
(Figure -4), with designs that matches the Indian requirement to some extent
(Ref figure 4)
Frame size as per DIN ISO 5970. Frame Frame size as per DIN ISO 5970 and CEN.
features. Height adjustment in steps with Frame features. Height adjustment in steps
hexagon key or hand-wheel. Table top of with hexagon key or hand-wheel. Table top
melamine-resin coated chipboard with plastic of melamine-resin coated chipboard with
edges or seamless moulded-on plastic edges or seamless moulded-on
polyurethane. Safety edges. Top with polyurethane safety edges. Top with recessed
recessed or moulded-in storage tray and or moulded-in storage tray and stop-edge
stop-edge equivalent to KU or PU. Features equivalent to KU or PU. Features of top.
of top. Maintenance-free, working surface Maintenance-free, working surface inclinable
inclinable in steps (0°; 5°; 10°; 16°; in steps (0°; 5°; 10°; 16°; 20°) with horizontal
20°).Accessories and options. Glides for shelf. Accessories and options. Glides for
hard and soft floors and briefcase (satchel) hard and soft floors and briefcase (satchel)
hooks. Plywood or grid bookshelf or chair hooks. Plywood or grid bookshelf or chair
suspension for all VS school chairs suspension for all VS school chairs
5.0 Classroom Size: The size of a classroom can have profound effects
on students for many reasons. For example individuals from different
cultures vary in their preferred inter-personal distances during conversation.
Every student has an “invisible boundary” around his or her body, often
referred to as “personal space”. If someone pierces this boundary, the student
will feel uncomfortable and step back. Often, classrooms are overcrowded
which force invasions of personal space between students. Generally in Indian
Schools classrooms are overcrowded with 40-70 students in a class.
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It has also been shown that certain colors can increase student’s auditory-
verbal memory skills. This would certainly be beneficial during the common
activity of teachers lecturing to students, and through the use of audio books in
the classroom. Students who have a more positive attitude toward their
learning environment due to the room’s color scheme will learn more
effectively, have better attendance and ultimately perform better.
References:
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Method for School Furniture Design to Prevent Musculoskeletal Disorders among
Pupils, J Res Health Sci, Vol. 8, No.2, 2008, pp. 9-12
7. Evaluation of three types of school furniture according to prEN 1729, R.R.E.E.
Motmansa, a Product Ergonomics Research Centre, Katholieke Hogeschool
Limburg, Genk, Belgium
8. Aha learning resources Inc.: http://www.aceofflorida.org/helpdesk/index.html
(Ronald D. Froman).
9. Practical Teaching Strategies, For Inexperienced and New Teachers,
http://www.priceless-teaching-strategies.com/
10. Minakshi Agarwal, Solution Exchange ( a UN network of experts), New
Delhi
Annexure -1
School Furniture - Dimensions of Chairs (Seating) as per ISO - 5970
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1) For size 0, the identification colour and the height of seat only are standardized.
2) h5 is measured to the highest Point of the front of the seating area on the centre
line.
3) t4 is measured on the centre line of the seat plane from the front edge to a
perpendicular line from reference Point W.
4) W is the maximum height of foremost Point of backrest.
5) Room for free movement of the posterior in the writing Position should be
ensured.
6) h6 and h7 are measured on the centre line of the seat plane from the lowest part
of the seating surface.
7) The upper and lower edge of the backrest should be well rounded.
8) r1 is the approximate radius of the top surface. The curve need not be an exact
arc of a circle.
9) r2 is the radius of the backrest in a horizontal plane.
10) δ: the main part of the seating surface shall lie between the horizontal
and a slope of 4o maximum. The seating surface may be flat or include dishing. Any
dishing shall occur in the back two-thirds of the effective seat depth. The deepest
part of the dishing shall occur at the back part of the effective seat depth.
11) β is the angle between the horizontal and the plane of the backrest
between h7 and Won the centre line of the seat. The Profile of the backrest between
h6 and W is not defined.
Annexure -2
Annexure -3
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