Transforming architectural history through experiential learning
While the content of university courses on architectural history has changed greatly in the past few years, how they are taught often remains rooted in tradition. For the most part, students are lectured to, read what has been written, write in isolation, and never think about their work again. These inherited ways of teaching reinforce the disciplinary norms of the very same discipline that we’re trying to renovate. If we’re teaching about breaking down the canon and de-centering, then we need to find productive forms of assignments that do not reinforce the old silos and notions of the singular genius. How can we make coursework meaningful to students, and possibly to the public at large? How can we shape our courses so that they learn skills and understand their impact on the interpretation of the built environment? As much as the content, the format of coursework impacts the way that students think. To fully transform architectural history, it’s time that we carefully and critically examine assignments in the architectural history classroom.
“To fully transform architectural history, it’s time that we carefully and critically examine assignments in the architectural history classroom.”
Experiential learning (EL) can help with this. Here, I’d like to share an EL project that I conducted in my undergraduate architectural history seminar at the University of Toronto. I will run you through how it came together, how it was implemented, and offer some observations and challenges, in case you’re interested in trying out some of these ideas for yourself. In short, this project was not too drastically different from what we typically do with architectural history students, but with drastically different results. In sharing this experience, I hope to offer a small step in the right direction toward transforming architectural history education.
What is experiential learning?
“Experiential learning” has become something of a pedagogical buzzword in the past few years. While the concept has been around since the 1970s, its applications and definition are often poorly understood in academic practice today.
The Association for Experiential Education sums it up as follows: “Challenge and experience followed by reflection, leading to learning and growth.” Basically, the idea is to connect and apply academic content to the world beyond, and to recognize the learning and skill development that came from it. The University of Toronto, further defines it as:
“Collaboration with academic units and community partners ensures we create relevant, high calibre opportunities that enrich the student experience and prepare students for life and career after graduation. Initiatives include work-integrated learning, internships, career-engaged learning, community-engaged learning, research opportunities, international opportunities and Indigenous-related opportunities.”
Figure 1. Wong Dai Sin Temple, Markham, Ontario, Canada, from student Jiawen Wang’s article. Shim-Sutcliffe Architects, 2015. Photo: Shim-Sutcliffe Architects
In short, it boils down to meaningful work with an external partner. This is something that is well understood in architecture schools and in the sciences—when we think of a practicum or a work-year, for instance, it is often in the context of engineering programs, labs for chemistry, or even studio work in architecture. In this light, it may seem far beyond the remit of the architectural history classroom. But then again, maybe we just need to rethink what our coursework might look like.
My mandate when I was hired as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto was to develop new courses in Canadian architectural history that implemented experiential learning, as part of the Canada Constructed Initiative. So, unlike a work-term or a practicum, I had to figure out how this concept could be mobilized in the context of a single humanities course, and in a particular sub-field of art and architectural history at that. How was I supposed to integrate work experience with an external partner into my architectural history courses? And during a pandemic, while teaching remotely?
Creating the project
In a fourth-year undergraduate seminar called Studies in Canadian Architecture and Landscapes: Hidden Canada, in the Department of Art History that I delivered in the spring of 2021, I had the students explore overlooked narratives in the architectural history of Canada and to explore issues of race, religion, public space, heritage, gender, class, and more. The goal of the course was to get students involved in heritage and to engage critically with the built environment around them. Still working under remote teaching conditions (due to the pandemic), I also wanted to create a sense of community and purpose, especially at a time of high burnout when coursework was in danger of feeling particularly pointless.
Figure 2. Numbers 9 and 11 Spadina Road, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, from student Rylee Lachance Linklater’s article. Photo: Rylee Lachance Linklater
To make this true experiential learning, I needed to find and pair with a partner organization. I also wanted to make sure that it was an organization that would share similar goals and that would be amenable to working with a group of students. In consultation with the Office of Experiential Learning and Outreach Support (ELOS) at UofT, I started targeted negotiations with local organizations. The resulting partnership and project was carried out with the Architectural Conservancy of Ontario’s NextGen program. The Architectural Conservancy of Ontario (ACO) is an education and advocacy non-profit, with the goal of encouraging “the conservation and reuse of structures, districts and landscapes of architectural, historic and cultural significance, to inspire and benefit Ontarians.” The ACO NextGen is a youth-oriented branch within the larger ACO, that seeks to bring together young people interested in heritage and architecture, and to provide opportunities for them.
The process of pulling this together was collaborative. ACO NextGen executives shared a few of their initiatives in which students might get involved. I pitched my ideas (with departmental standards in mind), and we discussed how we could come to a happy medium. Then, I drafted a contract, including the terms of working together—instructor, student, and partner responsibilities—as well as intellectual property rights, non-exclusivity agreements, etc. They made amendments, we agreed, and the “ACO NextGen X UofT Hidden Canada project” was born.
For the final product, students would prepare public-facing articles for the ACO NextGen’s newly created blog, to be published as a special series at the end of term. In line with the topic of the class, the NextGen executives provided areas of interest from their perspective (to their membership but also as they saw the need in the field of heritage), focusing on overlooked aspects of Toronto’s architecture. These included: underrepresented and marginalized architects (i.e. women and members of the Indigenous, Black, and 2SLGBTQIA+ communities); non-Western typologies (i.e. mosques, Buddhist temples, etc.); and low-income housing and/or neighborhoods. The focus on Toronto would shift as we gave into the realities of remote work in the pandemic, but the overarching themes remained intact.
To help manage the task and to ensure quality control (especially since we were working for an external partner), I scaffolded the assignment, breaking it down into a proposal, an annotated bibliography, a draft, peer review, the final text (and images), and a short final, personal reflection. A reflective component is essential to experiential learning, but also, in running this project for the first time, the final reflections allowed me to solicit concrete feedback from the students on what went well, what didn’t, and what they took from the experience.
Figure 3. Illustration of an Iroquois Longhouse (1913) shows the curved and woven design of wooden supports, from student Ana Markovic’s article. Image: Wilbur F. Gordy, Stories of American History. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1913, p. 20.
Implementing the project
During the semester, the ACO NextGen reps came into the class to work with and help the students on their projects—including an initial presentation and topic consultation, as well as tips for blog writing. They additionally offered one-on-one help beyond the class hours. The students and I were fortunate in this case that two of the reps were architectural historians and the other two were journalists by trade, and so they had great insights and ideas for the students on all fronts. (Plus, the students had me, of course!)
I also scheduled other workshops to help the students along the way. These included a library workshop on conducting local research with two University of Toronto librarians (Margaret English and Elena Springall), a workshop on what makes a good article on architecture with Dr Elsa Lam, Editor in Chief of Canadian Architect magazine, and a peer-review workshop that was put together for us by Dr Erin Vearncombe from Writing-Integrated Teaching at UofT.
If you’re thinking, “whoa, this is a lot of class time”… it was. The course was run with a ‘flipped’ classroom model. Most of the content was delivered offline (short recorded lectures, films, readings, etc.), and following content-related discussion and the occasional guest talk, we would dedicate the rest of the class time each week to working on the project. It seemed to me that this was a much more effective mode of instruction given that we were on Zoom, but also given the collaborative nature of EL.
But it wasn’t all work and no play: in the last class, I invited everyone who participated and contributed to the project to a launch party, to officially kick off the publication of the texts, and to celebrate the student achievements across the term. Zoom parties had already slightly lost their luster by the end of the spring of 2021, but it was still a nice way to wrap up the term.
Figure 4. First Peoples’ House, University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, from student Mehek Raman’s article. Alfred Waugh, 2010. Photo: Menno Hubregtse
The project itself
Students quickly took to the suggested themes and typologies, and were eager to explore their overlooked narratives. These are young, critical thinkers, particularly attuned to these kinds of issues in the wake of contemporary events and politics. The result was that they were able to explore topics that mattered to them.
“These are young, critical thinkers, particularly attuned to these kinds of issues in the wake of contemporary events and politics.”
To present the Hidden Canada series online, I provided an introduction, and the overarching themes and individual topics were as follows (please feel free to read along!):
A reexamination of places of worship
Miyopin Cheechoo, “The Perseverance of The Mysterious St. Thomas Church”
Bailey Storey, “How Douglas Cardinal Brought Indigenous Perspectives into St. Mary’s Catholic Church”
Jiawen Wang, “The Yin-Yang Spirit of Markham’s Hovering Temple”
Housing solutions
Jessica Fisher, “The Possibility of Garden City Design in Canadian Suburbs”
Rylee Lachance Linklater, “The History and Future of Rooming Houses in the Annex, Toronto”
And contemporary Indigenous architectures
Ana Markovic, “Building on Tradition with the Anishinaabek Discovery Centre”
Mehek Rahman, “Indigenous Design and Sustainability in the First Peoples House”
Christine Sutcliffe, “The Gathering Circle and Indigenous Place-Making in Ontario”
Figure 5. St. Mary’s Catholic Church, Red Deer, Alberta, Canada, from student Bailey Storey’s article. Douglas Cardinal, 1964. Photo: Robert Storey
Observations
In reflecting on their experience with the project and what they learned, one student had this to say: “True Canadian architecture […] is not limited to a particular group, but a multitude of groups and cultures, and their places within the urban landscapes of Canada must be consistently acknowledged and celebrated.” The course content was reinforced through the work that the student did in producing their own article, but also in seeing the work of their peers through open collaboration.
Another student noted that “the project has illuminated for me that narratives about cultural heritage can change and become louder with enough support.” While this could be construed as a hypothetical, another student did work to change the conversation around their selected building. This student was asked to help with the heritage designation effort for the site, but did not like the direction that was being promoted. They said:
“How could they celebrate this heritage?! This heritage of colonialism, of white supremacy, of Canadian nationalism. This heritage of violence and genocide… It is a community gathering space, it is not just a church. I feel like I did this for my granny, who was a hardcore Christian (thanks to residential school), and is buried in that church graveyard. That is my heritage.”
The student pushed back by quitting the official project to research and write what was important to them and their community, to make sure that this overlooked story was told. All of this is to say that representation matters. It matters in the buildings that we teach, the buildings that we designate, and the ways in which we ask students to engage with them. All of my students said that following this course they had a newfound interest in heritage and wanted to pursue it further. One student said: “One of the first steps that I would advocate for is changing criteria for ‘heritage,’ so that historically suppressed narratives are better represented moving forwards.”
Figure 6. Exploring Tiffany Crescent in the Beaverbrook suburb, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, from student Jessica Fisher’s article. Photo: Jessica Fisher
Impact & results
Aside from the learning goals and personal sense of accomplishment of the students, the articles were well received. Of the partnership, the ACO NextGen Chair, Irene Galea said:
“The articles were widely shared among the ACO and heritage community, and remain a fixture on the ACO NextGen blog as an example of high-quality heritage reporting with diverse lens. The project underlined the importance of exploring and sharing the overlooked and undocumented histories of our built environment. The project also jumpstarted a longstanding relationship between ACO NextGen and Canada Constructed, where UofT students have spent a term working with the organization in order to learn about the heritage world.”
There was a lot of interest from the UofT community, but also beyond. Students shared the articles with their friends and family, and with their communities.
The students were also able to leverage the articles and connections made with the ACO NextGen for their own gain. One student submitted their piece for a public writing competition, placing second overall. Another signed up for the ACO NextGen’s annual job shadow, an experience that she used on her (successful!) grad school application. And another worked with the ACO NextGen in collaboration with the Cookstown Community Development Team to create a proposal for the reuse of a heritage building in Cookstown, Ontario.
As a bonus, most of the students have since kept in touch; the goal of creating community in the remote environment really worked.
Words of advice
Figure 7. St. Thomas, Moose Factory, Ontario, Canada, from student Miyopin Cheechoo’s article. Photo: Miyopin Cheechoo
The project was not without its challenges. For instance, from planning to practice, we had to alter the scope of the assignment. Originally, the idea was to select buildings in Toronto, but once the class began, I found out that less than half of the students were located in Toronto. This would have made local research challenging, so we provided the option to select buildings Canada-wide. Most of them went out and picked local buildings that they could visit and explore in real life to conduct place-based learning. That way, even though we were working remotely, they could feel connected to their selected topic. This, however, changed an original component of the assignment that would have required students to contribute their findings to ACO’s Toronto architecture database. Without a comparable province- or Canada-wide database, I removed it as a graded requirement (once I had the class list), since not all students could do it. Navigating a project like this might be easier in person rather than online, but one should be ready to make modifications to even the best laid plans.
Interestingly, students noted that they thought this project would be easy compared to the standard lengthy essays that they typically produce for a fourth-year course. In the end, however, they told me that they actually put more work into this concise piece of writing. Since their essays were going to be read not just by me but a broader public, there was an added sense of pressure too. Some felt stressed and overwhelmed by this until they got further along in the project. This bears some consideration going forward.
Front to back, this project took a long time on my part, both before the course and after. It took several discussions by Zoom and rounds of emails with ACO NextGen, not to mention lengthy discussions with ELOS on what experiential education could look like in the context of a course in the humanities. I wouldn’t recommend taking this on at the last hour of planning for a course. On the back end, the ACO NextGen blog editor took on lots of work in preparing the posts, but also helping with image permissions for several of the articles. It is important to find a compatible and patient partner to work with.
I also had a small course enrolment cap—in the end I had 9 students in the class including one audit, so we had a small group for this test case. It was much easier to be flexible and work collaboratively with this small group, especially for this trial run. I’m not saying this kind of model wouldn’t work with a larger class, but I found it easier to dip my toes in a smaller puddle this first time around.
Figure 8. Awen Gathering Place, Collingwood, Ontario, Canada, from student Christine Sutcliffe’s article. Photo: David Whittaker, courtesy of Brook McIlroy Inc.
Final thoughts
Lastly, this was a team effort. I’m not saying that this was a problem, per se, but it did take a village. The project would not have been possible without the collaboration of all of the various people and organizations that I’ve mentioned throughout this short text. But this is a good thing! It teaches students about what it’s like to research and write beyond the classroom—it’s rarely a solo sport, especially when it comes to public scholarship.
“Traditional coursework reinforces traditional practices of architectural history, where only the few are qualified to decide what matters and what does not. EL helps to flip the gatekeeping model of the lone, tortured genius and to subvert the classroom model of the sage on the stage.”
And, really, isn’t this a central problem with architectural history? Traditional coursework reinforces traditional practices of architectural history, where only the few are qualified to decide what matters and what does not. EL helps to flip the gatekeeping model of the lone, tortured genius and to subvert the classroom model of the sage on the stage. In this model, knowledge is not a one-way transfer, but a dynamic process. My students were not just submitting work to jump through a hoop, but adding their own voices to public discourse, earning a stake, no matter how small, in how history is written.
In the ACO NextGen X UofT Hidden Canada Project, students were still doing rigorous research, writing, and revising, but with just a few little tweaks, it gave students a say, letting them know that they belong. That they can contribute to and engage with the field in a meaningful way. Are they all groundbreaking articles? Not necessarily, but they were transformative for the student experience and in shifting their notions of the discipline of architectural history. If we’re going to teach change, we need to practice what we preach.
--
With special thanks to my collaborators at the ACO NextGen, Irene Galea, Katerina Bong, Louisa Simmons, and Pauline Walters, and to Ainsley Goldman and Colin McMahon at the ELOS office at the University of Toronto.
