Child Friendly Communities

As children, we are naturally inquisitive of the world we are in. We thrive for answers to the many questions that life experiences toss at us. We are natural learners, and the world we are living in is our classroom. So how does this ‘world’ shape the adults of tomorrow? 

Paul’s presentation looked at a couple of theories which have been widely accepted and adopted by educators world wide. The first is generationism where we can begin to characterise some typical traits attributable to our children, Generation Z’s, to help understand them better. The second is Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences Theory. Through understanding what intelligences are strongest and weakest in our children, we can create environments which foster engaging and stimulating learning environments to meet the multiple levels in which these Gen Z’ers operate. Perhaps if we provide environments which engage and stimulate our children on multiple levels, we’ll possibly see a reduction in the number of ADD statistics. 

Paul looked at a Redbrook Hays Primary Rugeley, John Madejski Acadamy in Reading (UK) and The Avenue - special needs educational facility in Reading which he visited in the UK during an extension of my Dulux Study Tour of 2009, which all reflect characteristics of such engaging and stimulating environments. As part of bringing these experiences back to Perth, Paul also presented at the design of the Ballajura Youth and Community Centre which Site Architecture is currently working. These projects also take into account these Generational theories and ideas of stimulating the multiple intelligences through good design.