William Edelglass, Marlboro College
Questions of space and place are at the heart of much recent educational theory and practice. School communities are conditioned by architecture, local social structures, and the natural environment. The spatial turn in education has also prompted the implementation of place- and community- based learning, which includes service-learning. Place-based education seeks to overcome the divide marked by classroom walls through grounding learning in lived experience via the exploration of local cultural studies, nature studies, real-world problem solving in the community, internships and entrepreneurial opportunities, and induction into community decision-making processes.
This paper reviews the philosophical roots and academic implications of place-based pedagogy.