Willow Park Junior School + Arckit

The renowned Willow Park Junior School in Blackrock is amongst the very first schools in Ireland to make Arckit’s ‘hands-on’ architectural learning tool accessible to their students.

Both the Principal, Mr. James Docherty and Vice Principle Mr. Cormac Mc Aleer are acutely aware of the urgent need for new teaching methods to be introduced in the classroom that are wholly appropriate for the modern era we live in today.

We are at a critical moment in education where we as a society are compelled to give our next generation the chance and opportunity to be upskilled with the necessary skillsets to help them embrace their future with confidence and enthusiasm. At Arckit, we support the concept of student led classrooms, where pupils are encouraged to interact and collaborate together,  to ask questions and to find solutions. 

We had the immense pleasure of recently running an introductory workshop at Willow Park in what was an action packed hour and an half. We discussed and got the students opinions on architecture, sustainability, the environment, climate change, energy efficiencies and more.

We then quickly got down to business, firstly using Arckit to explain scale, measurement and volume. We then asked the students to measure their classroom, draw it to scale 1:50 (1/4 imperial) and then design their dream apartment. In a matter of moments, they grasped these elements that might otherwise have been much more difficult to communicate and understand if taught in another way. We believe that the impact of ‘learning by doing’ is both profound and lasting.

Finally we asked the students to form groups of four and collaboratively build an Arckit scale model of their apartment in just 20 mins. From having never heard of or used Arckit before, the results were fantastic as were their presentations.

If you are interested in making Arckit accessible for your schools, workshops, home schools or libraries please get in touch with us at info@arckit.com. We’d love to hear from you.