An Experimental Pedagogy of Concept Development in the Introductory Architectural Design Studio

The introductory architectural design studio has a significant role in design education, as the students are required to synthesize both a physical and conceptual response to variousdesign issues without any prior knowledge or practical experience. We present an experimental educational approach that we developed for and implemented in the introductory architectural design studio, which compromises between direct instruction and self-exploration. In this approach, design learning and concept development are processes of discovery and exploration that result from the dynamic interactions between a concept schema that we presented in the studio as a pedagogical scaffold, and the students’ internalcognitive schemas. We consider students’ schema development as a complex process of emergence and self-organization, during which new meanings and value systems arise through the acts of deconstructing and reconstructing the concept schema. In this paper, we discuss the theoretical foundations, structure and application of this approach and present the student work that support its use in the architectural design studio.