@phdthesis{discovery1349170,
            note = {Thesis digitised by British Library EThOS. The disk that contains the appendix for this thesis has not been digitised.},
            year = {1996},
           title = {Architectural concept formation: transmission of knowledge in the design studio in relation to teaching methods},
          school = {University of London},
          author = {Marda, N},
        abstract = {This Thesis explores learning within the context of architectural studio teaching. It
focuses on the way in which teaching and learning takes place in discussions on
architectural design among tutors, students and visiting critics in the context of the
presentation of student work in interim and final reviews. As reviews are based on an
oral presentation and discusslon of students' work(feedback), their verbal content
can be analysed to reveal the structure of architectural learning In the design studio.
Research was undertaken at two separate locations over two consecutive time
periods: first, in the late 1980's at the Bartlett School of Architecture, U. C. L. and then in
the early 1990's at the School of Architecture and Landscape at the University of
Greenwich. The Thesis therefore examines the shift In architectural education that
took place In London during the late 1980's and early 1990's. The research involved
recording and transcribing into the form of a text, the content of architectural design
reviews which took place at both schools. The text was then analysed in terms of its
content, form and structure, at the Bartlett, recordings were made of twenty seven
reviews from the first, the third, and the diploma year (nine each), at Greenwich, a
comparative sample was recorded of nine first year and nine third year reviews. The
aim was twofold: a) to examine how the dialogue in reviews and the students' designs
progressively matured over the years, and b) to Identify the extent to which the new
pedagogy changed the structure of the learning interaction in the design studio.
It was found that reviews at the Bartlett operated mainly at an Intellectual/conceptual
level, were analytical and focused on the final building design. The participants drew
on background knowledge In the form of theory, technology and precedents. These
aspects were found to be used implicitly in the design studio. Reviews at Greenwich,
which represent the current London educational scene, were found to be more
intuitive and experiential. They operated mainly at a visual level and focused on the
design process through explicit teaching methods. The creative activity of constructing
new design rules in formal/visual architectural terms ('foregrounding') was dominant.
Both educational systems revealed that architectural concepts are formed at the
visual and intellectual level simultaneously, by the interaction of the two, despite their
different balance (visual/ intellectual) in each pedagogic mode. The clarity of the
discussion during the reviews was influenced only by the extent to which the
visual/intellectual interaction was explicitly acknowledged as a key component of the
teaching method. The Thesis therefore argues that 2-D and 3-D representations are
active In Initiating architectural cognition, and perhaps It is only these visual
representations that are able to initiate 'foregrounding'. At both schools, at all
educational levels, the design students decision making was found to remain stable,
and architectural concepts progressed from simple to complex, not in a predictable
and linear fashion but in a circular, iterative process.
Finally, the Thesis questions the existence of the concept of a 'central Idea' or 'parti'
that brings all the design rules together, Among students this was found to be more of
an ideal than a reality, as these rules seem to come together in the form of a 'collage'
rather than as a rational structure.},
             url = {https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1349170/}
}