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How might a school building teach students about the value of water?

Monitoring and metering our resources - both consumption and production - will become increasingly important in a sustainable society.  A need to modify our consumption practices against our production capacities depends on our ability to understand both.  Children play an important role in introducing new behaviours into the home.

These school buildings harvest solar power and water as part of their environmentally sustainable design (ESD).   They use smart sustainable technology.  For example, water harvesting takes place all over the buildings because more rain hits the side than the roof.  The school structures and layouts are used to teach students about sustainability, shifting their purpose from static shells to interactive spaces.

Solar technology can be beautiful and offer us new ways to think about the surfaces of buildings. The water-monitoring system is integrated into several areas of the school. In the science rooms, water filter systems are observed and the students monitor water quality. Out in the gardens, rainwater harvesting and current reserve levels are clear and understandable. The vulnerability of the wetland habitat becomes evident each time it dries up. There are science gardens and vegetable gardens where children can learn about environmental systems and growing food. The gardens are located outside the relevant classrooms. Working in the gardens breaks down the divisions between outside and inside, important and wild, relevant and natural, learning and doing, cause and effect, science and the world, eating and harvesting and food and plants. The emphasis is on native plants and their value.  Students learn about the plants' climactic tolerance as well as their different flavours, benefits and properties.

Designer:Joanne Nataprawira
Domain: Architecture
Studio: Smart Green Schools
Studio Leaders: Dominique Hes and Kirsty Fletcher