Impact of Classroom Lay-out into Proactive Learning

Abstract

INTRODUCTION There had been a lot of research pertaining to teaching instruction and learning, however, there are a few studies on seat locations. Seat locations, according to Fernandes et al. (2011) is the student’s location in the classroom. There has been a belief that students are motivated based on where they were seated inside the classroom. That is, these students’ academic performance were also affected. Still, some beliefs state that the students who seat at the back are the bad students while students who seat at the front row are the good students (Fernandes et al, 2011). However, Bicard et al, (2012) indicated that seating location is the ‘easiest, most cost-effective classroom management tactics’ that is in favour of the teachers as they studied. This seating location might be of help to the teachers in minimizing disruptive behaviours inside the classroom. Communication, however, is related to seating arrangement in terms of effective classroom understanding (McCorskey & McVetta, 1978). Having seat location as an important factor in classroom management, there is a need to identify if seat location matters to Senior High learners. These senior high learners are basically the first and second year students of the tertiary level in the Philippines. It is due to this equivalent that there was a belief that learners who are in the tertiary level could already choose in which seat they want to position themselves. It is as they are already of age to identify their learning suitability. This research paper aims to determine the applicability of this notion on which seats the learners prefer, and who should make the decision as to where students sit: teachers or learners. All senior high school learners were able to seat accordingly as they were provided with enough number of armchairs. Thus, all the senior high school learners were accommodated ABSTRACT This study experimented in the use of classroom lay-out, its effectiveness inside the classroom, and its preference for its location. Classroom lay-out involves the learners, their seat locations, and the teacher’s preferences. It used the qualitative inquiry with the phenomenology approach in interpreting the results from the students’ responses. Total enumeration sampling was used where all the students in the Senior high school of Irisan National High School were part of the data gathering respondents. Responses to queries were collected through interviews with the respondents. Results showed that the learners would prefer the teacher to identify where they are to be seated instead of them choosing their own seats. Classroom lay-out might entail an effective strategy to boost the academic performance of a learner, especially in the researcher’s classes in terms of self-assessment and showing of authority. However the learners think of assessing themselves in terms of their seat location and the classroom layout, they still see the teacher as the one in authority in leading the effectiveness of the classroom lay-out.