Instructional Levity in the Architecture Studio

Abstract

Architecture education is typically cast as trying and bleak, a simultaneous exercise in sleep deprivation and innovation. While practicing architects’ hours and pay are rationalized with, ‘You do it because you love it’, students of architecture should too be situated to argue that their education is a similarly joyful pursuit. This work does not suggest revelry and jokes in studio, but rather that instructors adopt pedagogical methodologies that engender lively engagement, and ultimately joy. Two benefits of levity in the architecture pedagogy are of particular interest. First, the impact on student engagement and experimentation. Second, the impact on learning. Levity, appropriately incorporated in the studio curriculum, can improve the academic experience and quality of student work. This research is not ‘soft’ or ‘fun’ – to be written off as lacking in rigor and seriousness. Instead, it is an unapologetic suggestion that bringing lightness into the work of architecture studio instructors can elevate student output. In fact, this has been experienced this first hand; when asked for feedback on such pedagogical innovations, a student remarked, ‘These unconventional ideas made me excited to design, it made the grueling hours fun, and it made me proud to put out the work I did’. Introductory examples of such applications of levity in studio teaching at The New Jersey Institute of Technology and feedback gathered from students along the way support such success. Following this, a more in-depth survey the prevailing scholarship on humor in academic instruction (the Instructional Humor Processing Theory) substantiates its place in the architecture studio. This paper aims to provide narrative examples of such pedagogical methodologies, setting the groundwork for future study.