Internal spaces

A place to learn and play

Internal spaces

Similar to the external spaces, looking at how the building works and can operate internally will determine a successful outcome.In the same fashion, one size doesn’t fit all and consideration to a changing cohort may need to be addressed.Visiting other facilities provides the best evidence of what does and doesn’t work. It acts as a real-time, free lessons learnt experience. However, it must be remembered that the school cohort will play an important part in how the building is working, and whether the building is a single or two storey construction, as feedback has shown this to affect internal and external spaces.

Over the pages, questions are posed in a checklist format, based on the research suggestions that highlight areas that can be considered before, and during, the progression of your design.

General considerations

Before getting into the detail of the individual spaces that you'll need to apply some thought to, it is worth beginning with the overarching considerations for the internal spaces.

The questions below play more towards how other schools have thought about using their facility out of hours, but also in terms of some applications that are relevant to all areas:

Is there an opportunity for your school to be used out of hours, for example community use?

What security and access needs will be required for this to be achieved?

Will you look to compartmentalise or zone your building as part of the access and security strategy?

How will this feed into your overall security plan?

How will you approach robustness and acoustics throughout the build in terms of doors, walls and floors, making sure the balance of materials and design is suitable but not institutionalised?

What anti-ligature strategy will you require - although this is cohort dependant, be aware of the specification shortfalls by thinking about which specialists you can engage to advise for your facilities?

What floor, wall and ceiling coverings are appropriate for your learners' needs?

Considering some young people may have had bad mainstream school experience, how can you make this setting more accessible and feel less like a school?

Classrooms and specialist teaching

From age group to hoisting needs, floor coverings to ventilation requirements, there are a number of elements that feed into that perfect learning environment.

Here are just some of the questions that have arisen during our knowledge forums to pose whilst developing your brief:

How are you organising your age groups and what class sizes will you have?

Could you consider a graphic representation diagram to understand the starting point?

What floor coverings will help you balance cleanliness with comfort and acoustic performance?

What activities do you need to offer in the school that you will need spaces for?

What ventilation strategy will best serve the comfort of the pupils all year round?

How can you be flexible in your classroom spaces to allow for future cohorts?

What interactive equipment is needed particularly in the specialist spaces?

Does every classroom have a kitchenette and access to water/sinks?

How can classrooms access break out and external spaces easily?

What group rooms and break out spaces are needed?

Do primary and secondary spaces differ?

What are the hoisting needs in terms of heights and spans in your classroom?

Halls, dining rooms and social spaces

During the feedback sessions and knowledge forums, there were a variety of case examples of how different layout strategies, especially with dining halls, can work for the school.

Use these questions to help you think about the possibilities, narrowing this down to which options will best suit your strategy for now, and into the future:

Where will the hall (and other specialist provisions like the pool and community rooms) be located to work with your access and security strategy?

How will your kitchen and servery operate with the dining spaces - will you need smaller more segregated dining areas to reduce noise and distraction?

Would one large, mixed dining space work for you and your cohort? Consider the setting of this?

Would a central kitchen with two serveries work for your facility?

Can you make dual use of the dining space?

If so, consider how you set up and clean down?

Typically dining space provision does not take into account higher staff ratios (teachers sitting with children) - how can you accommodate this?

Can you make the dining space feel less like a hall and more like a café?

Is there an opportunity for a social enterprise to use a café or dining space and offer life skills for some young people?

How many non-ambulant users are there in the space and is there adequate circulation space?

Is there an alternative dining space for children and young people who need to be fed differently?

What is the provision of toilets in key locations for staff and students taking account of busy times?

Have you considered the height and location of the main sports hall as this needs to be double height and could disrupt upper floor areas?

Is the main hall used for sport and what markings are required?

Where do performances take place - can this be integrated or does it need another space?

Therapy, sensory and group rooms

Specialist sensory, therapy and group room needs can vary from school to school, but all of them needed specialist equipment and spaces.

Have you visited other schools to see how new sensory areas are used?

Would cooling be needed in these areas?

How do you maintain and keep these rooms when there is pressure on pupil numbers?

How can sensory technology be integrated within hydrotherapy pool areas?

How will ICT, FF&E and M&E specialisms co-ordinate to make these rooms work?

Do classrooms also have sensory needs (eg dimming lights, changing colours)

What is the balance between traditional sensory rooms and targeted therapies?

What outside therapy spaces are needed?

Would an easily accessible 'care suite' hub help visiting care professionals or are distributed areas more appropriate for your cohort?

Do therapy areas need to be accessed out of hours/out of term time? Would a therapy zone support this?

Where numbers of group rooms are difficult, is it possible to use open plan areas in the circulation?

How can you ensure group rooms, breakout spaces and one-to-one space needs are logged early so expectations are integrated into the design?

Built in floor trampolines are popular for rebound therapy (internal and external) - have you considered these early for budgetary and construction constraints?

Hydrotherapy pool

The hydrotherapy pool is one of the most specialist elements of design and construction in a SEND school.

Of particular consideration is the strategy around pool accessibility, as well as its connection to the rest of the school. Ask the following questions during your briefing development:

How will you enable hoisting direct from the personal care areas into the pool, but still ensure the process offers dignity?

How will you ensure your hoist design extends over the pool by at least 2m to prevent any accidents when lowering?

Is it possible for the hoist to cover the whole pool area?

How will any steps into the pool be designed? In the corner or full width across?

If you are a campus school, do you need another hydrotherapy pool? Or could one be a warmer water pool for great third party use opportunities?

Can you consider ladders into the pool to train users?

Are sensory provisions important for your pool as AV equipment in the pool area generally stretches the budget?

What depth, width, length and shape will offer the greatest flexibility for your users?

What suitable space will you need to allow for around the pool to house pool covers, showers, storage, AV control, chemical access and plant areas?

How will the pool be accessible out of hours for community use to help fund raise and pay the for pool costs?

Staff, reception, offices, meeting rooms

These often overlooked areas are so important to the functionality of a school. It is here that we have to look beyond the cohort.

This bigger picture research helped us curate a series of questions to consider:

How many people does a conference room need to hold to allow for multi-agency meetings, etc?

Are PPA (staff work) areas adequately provided for and are they separate to the staff social space or incorporated within?

Where will your reception sit within the building and who is it catering for?

Is the reception an admin hub and how is privacy/acoustic separation provided?

Does the reception size offer a welcoming space where people have the space to sit and wait?

Is there a need for a small meeting room or parents room in this space?

How will you approach security to the entrance doors, air locks, secure lobbies and draft lobbies?

How you you want this space to work?

Should staff social and refreshment spaces be one central room, or distributed throughout the building?

How many meetings with different disciplines are needed - how does this play into space provision?

Can staff and multi-disciplinary professionals have work and prep space together to enable joined up thinking?

Can meeting rooms and the admin/business hub be near the front of the school to save visitors going through the school?

Storage

Keeping your school clean and tidy, whilst enabling staff to be able to access equipment swiftly is an important part of school life.

Some of the questions to consider for this include the following:

What items need storing at your school?

Is wardrobe style storage possible in the school to cater for coat and bag storage to save space?

How will you appropriately locate mobility equipment storage for easy access?

How will you store equipment that needs charging?

What external storage do you need for bikes?

With SEND schools, there is no defined 'PE Kit provision' - is it important you schedule this early?

Is it possible to use the kitchen servery as a storage area for chairs and dining?

Are there any innovative furniture designs that enable for better storage?

Have you visited other SEND schools to understand how they have dealt with storage scheduling?

Can you take advantage of the full volume of space for storage (e.g. can resource storage go above mobility equipment)?

WC's and personal care

It is so important, for privacy and dignity, that these areas are located suitably and appropriately for the students and teachers.

Here are some of the questions that are worth considering when scheduling these areas:

How accessible do these areas need to be from every classroom?

What personal care spaces are needed? Be careful to consider the number and size which will vary according to needs and age of learners.

Is there appropriately located pupils and staff changing areas?

How will you schedule staff toilets so they don't have to leave classrooms for too long?

Where will you need to locate personal care space so that pupil movement is minimised and they are not 'wedged in' to the plan?

Will the noise from hand dryers be too distressing for pupils?

Does every personal care space need a sluice?

What type of hoist do you need in the personal care spaces?

What provision is needed in the hydrotherapy pool to work with hoisting and ambulant users?

Have you considered the power needs in the personal care spaces?

What are the lighting needs for these rooms?

Circulation

Often, the arrangement and strategy behind circulation can be overlooked, but it is a significant proportion of your overall area.

With this in mind, consider all your options for maximising the use of these areas, identifying opportunities for display, colourful wayfinding and storage.

How can you use circulation to offer added value as it takes up a large amount of your overall area?

Will your cohort see a long corridor as an opportunity for a running track - could you consider kinks in the corridor to avoid this?

How can you ensure corridors are wide enough to allow non-ambulant users to pass each other comfortably in wheelchairs or other support equipment

Is there adequate space for young people who may find small spaces difficult to be in?

Do you want to have alcoves off circulation for mobility equipment storage and resources and how will this be managed in terms of fire prevention?

How will you use access control to breakdown circulation spaces and create different zones?

How will design avoid hiding places?

Will indentations by class entrances provide waiting and passing space?

Can you use colour to assist with wayfinding?

Have you considered these as opportunities for artwork display?

Is natural daylighting and are external views important to you in circulation spaces?

Lifts

Lifts will only be relevant where your school is going to be delivered over two storeys plus.

However, it is important to ensure you consider the sizes, how many people need to access them and the ongoing maintenance costs, as research has shown this to be expensive.

How many lifts do you need and where will they be located?

What size do you need the lift to be, taking into account the different wheelchairs and beds needed?

Have you considered loading and unloading cycle times so you don't lose vital learning times?

Will the lift be needed for evacuation - if so, the numbers of people it can accommodate is crucial?

What are the maintenance costs going to be for your lift(s)?

Hoisting

Making sure you have hoist systems that offer maximum coverage across your rooms, really opens up the world to the possible for young people.

However, whilst looking into how this will be designed, research has shown considerations for structural load, room to room changeover and considering how the school can operate when a hoist is out of action are all key aspects of this area:

How will you ensure maximum coverage of rooms?

Which specialists can you work with to look at options such as 'H-frame' hoisting to define the requirements - how they charge is critical?

Have you considered how the structure is designed for hoist loads?

Will they be wall or ceiling mounted and if it is an existing building, can they be retrofitted?

Is there the option to use sling hoists so that children can stand?

Will you need to be able to undertake room to room changeover (for example a key hole through the door frame system)?

Have you considered how you will operate if the hoist is out of action?

Compartmentalisation, access, security

Access control and security is absolutely critical. Particularly in settings where people may see these elements of the design a target or a challenge.

The work you undertake within this section, will also help feed into your overall security strategy for the development.

What elements of the design might young people target as a challenge and how can you be clever about designing this out?

Have you considered how locking of doors and zoning areas is developed to carefully support how the school operates?

How will the access control and security strategy support out of hours and third party use?

What type of sounder do you want for fire and burglar alarms?

Have you considered whether the alarms are sensory overload for certain children and young people?

Would a double knock fire system allow better management of the building to investigate issues before a major alarm and evacuation is put into action?