Andrew Charleson - Tertiary Teaching Excellence Teaching Profile

Senior Lecturer School of Architecture, Victoria University of Wellington

Andrew Charleson has had the unenviable task of taking a compulsory set of Structures papers that architecture students disliked, and teaching them in such a way that students are now highly involved. Andrew has revitalised Structures through enthusiasm, innovative thinking and the transformation of course content to integrate it with other architectural areas. He is a firm believer in visual, tactile learning and is often seen wandering the streets of Wellington with a megaphone and students in tow. He has created the RESIST computer programme to teach students about structural loads, and how size, weight and earthquakes might affect buildings. The programme has now been successfully adapted for use in India. Andrew is continuously looking at ways to improve teaching Structures and has just published a book to further show its relevance for architecture students.

Structures - the green veges of architecture

Teaching Structures in a School of Architecture presents similar challenges to those that parents face in ensuring their children have a balanced diet. Students of architecture react to Structures like children eying green vegetables served up on their dinner plates. Although students realise that Structures is a necessary field of study they perceive it as little more than a necessary evil. After all, their passion is architecture, and in particular, architectural design. If they had a strong interest in structures they would have enrolled in a civil engineering program. Most students lean towards the artistry rather than the technology inherent in architecture.

Teaching philosophy and approaches

One of my life goals is to make a positive contribution wherever I find myself.

At present, teaching is a significant component of that contribution. Through my courses, the knowledge and understanding gained by my students leads to safer, and more economical and aesthetically pleasing architectural structures.

For me, teaching is an exciting challenge - one that requires and stretches all my personal skills and personality attributes, as well as my professional knowledge and experience. It exposes the duality within me - a quiet understated approach laced with self-deprecating humour and the contrasting requirement of performing in front of large classes. It is this awareness of challenge that motivates me to innovate. I seek to continually improve my teaching. Of course, there is always room for improvement - perhaps to offer a clearer explanation, or use a more apt anecdote - innovative teaching has enabled me to change student perceptions of my subject area and then to maintain those positive attitudes.

In almost every teaching situation I am conscious of the need to demonstrate my subject's relevance. I am always making connections between structures and the architecture they serve and can enrich. A key objective is to integrate Structures with other courses, and in particular, with Architectural Design. As much as possible I keep emphases real, drawing upon practical examples in order to provide a counterpoint to the necessary theory. Students are more able to engage with teaching material when it relates to their world of architecture, which I endeavour to enter. I speak the language of architecture, referring to the work of its heroes as I identify with the students' journey towards becoming architects and building scientists.

Primacy of understanding and student independence

My most important teaching objective is to develop students' understanding of the subject area and then to provide them with all necessary conceptual and analytical tools so they can function independently. Therefore there is little emphasis on memorisation. I constantly get the students to question the level of their understanding and encourage them verbally and by the nature of course assessments, to deepen their grasp of the subject. While a sound understanding is the first prerequisite for academic independence, students must also develop their pre-professional experience. This is less easily taught, but in order to empower them to engage in (preliminary) structural design largely independently of myself, I provide them with all the tools they need, and where necessary have developed new tools.

In order to meet the challenge explained previously and to develop students' understanding and independence, I have developed specific teaching approaches. First, I teach through modelling. Students learn significant aspects of course material by following my vocabulary and structural methodology. They learn how to approach, read and analyse structure by observing and listening.

Diversity in teaching and its refinement

Variety in teaching methods and learning environments is also very important to me. New and different teaching media and settings help maintain a freshness and vitality that are essential for dispelling the myth that Structures is boring. Learning that is enjoyable also creates a positive impression. If I don't enjoy a certain lecture, then neither will the students, and certainly my enthusiasm won't shine through. I assume there must be a better way of teaching that material and find one.

In all my teaching I take a careful strategic attitude to what I teach. I continually refine the curricula, removing less important material in order to devote more time to the more important concepts. In many ways this process epitomises modernist architect Mies van der Rohe's maxim ‘less is more'.

Attitudes to students

One reason for my success as a teacher undoubtedly stems from my attitude to students - encouraging, open, approachable and very positive. My relationship towards students could be described as similar to that of the qualified tradesperson to the apprentice, or as a senior practitioner towards his or her junior partners. I do not consider students as consumers or clients, but as talented young people needing to be guided towards a deep understanding of structural behaviour that will eventually find its expression in their works of architecture.

Excellence in innovation

There are three significant areas of innovation in my teaching. These are the integration of Structures with architectural design studio programs and the consequential development of the RESIST computer program; the diversity of innovative teaching media and environments; and finally, how my research has enriched teaching.

The challenge of increasing the perception of the relevance of Structures to architecture students is a recurring theme. One very effective way of achieving this aim has been to achieve a high level of integration between the two academically separate yet professionally linked disciplines. As there is no explicit school policy on this type of integration I achieved it informally, working with individual architecture design studio teachers. Now the majority of my course assessment is based on students' structural design of their design studio projects.

This has been made possible by my development of the RESIST computer program. RESIST enables designers to determine the numbers and sizes of earthquake and wind load resisting elements in a building. Essentially, RESIST undertakes structural analyses using the approach an experienced structural engineer would take for a preliminary structural design. RESIST's userfriendliness and graphic features makes it very useful and popular among architectural students.

RESIST overcomes the powerlessness students experience when needing to know how much structure is required to resist lateral loads. The program also enables students to very quickly get a feel for what structure is required in a given building and explore the various factors that affect the size of that structure, such as increased floor weights.

Diversity of teaching media and environments As a response to the challenge of increasing student engagement with Structures I continue to break away from the traditional (and often boring) teaching delivery methods. Talk and chalk lectures supplemented by classroom-based exercises have been significantly transformed. Every couple of years another classroom exercise is replaced by a site visit - often of a completed building which more than adequately meets the learning objectives of that particular session.

I use the following media in the lecture room including:

• informal tests on readings, followed by small but amusing prize-giving ceremonies.
• frequent use of analogy, especially to the human body, which includes structures that everyone can be made aware of. In one lecture I show x-rays of my knees to make an important point regarding structural timber connections!
• at the conclusion of most lectures I show sets of slides that illustrate how the material covered in the lectures relates to works of architecture.

At all times, material is presented carefully, clearly and sequentially, moving from simple to more complex concepts. Students are able to take high quality notes.

Numerous other learning experiences occur outside the lecture room such as:

• Visits to construction sites to experience and learn from real building construction.
• Visits to completed buildings in order to study them. We visit the VUW School of Music, the Salvation Army Citadel, Wellington Public Library, the Exchange Atrium, the Reading Theatres complex, two car-parking buildings and many others. Each visit relates to the immediately preceding lecture.
• Workshop exercises where students construct reinforced concrete and plywood web beams and then test them to destruction.
• ‘Structural walks' where classes follow specific routes encompassing selected buildings and construction sites that illustrate and complement lecture material.

Well over 50 percent of tutorials are now held outside conventional classrooms. Any space in the city and close to the school is used so long as it provides students with a relevant and stimulating learning environment.

Once again, the very positive student feedback confirms the effectiveness of introducing such a diverse range of media and environments. No one finds Structures boring!

Innovation through research

Major strands of my research endeavours are also motivated by the ever-present challenge of teaching Structures to architecture students.

My largest research project to date has as its main aim the demonstration of the relevance of Structures to architects. My book, Structure as Architecture: a Sourcebook for Architects and Engineers, has just been published. The research and writing that underpins it has already resulted in a huge enrichment of the innovative qualities of my teaching. The appreciation and communication of Structures' architectural significance is radically different from that within the engineering paradigm out of which most Structures courses throughout the world are taught.

The future

My next significant research-cum-teaching project is likely to be a book written for an international readership about how to design buildings to resist earthquakes. The book would be specifically targeted towards architects and architectural students. The teaching award grant will help fund expenses incurred in this project including updating my technological tools, travel and other costs.

Peer and Student Comments

As an indication of his success as a teacher, a proposal two years ago to replace his fourth year course with that of another subject was successfully opposed by students. They described his course as ‘the best in fourth year'!

Professor Gordon Holden, Head of the School of Architecture

Students enjoy his lectures - both the material and the nature of delivery. When asked, one student used the word ‘animated', with some amusement, to describe his presentation. Architecture is a visual discipline and Andrew has built up an exceptionally useful collection of visual material he uses in his classes. Many of the examples are local, but as far as I can tell, most are examples overseas. The breadth of this material is such, that it is my belief that the students' chief exposure to contemporary architecture takes place in Andrew's class! He presents this work, with an engineer's mind, through the architect's eye.

Robin Skinner, Lecturer, School of Architecture

In his courses Andrew draws from a large knowledge base of contemporary architecture, where structural systems have been explored in innovative ways. Andrew describes to the students the main structural design issues in clear and understandable terms. Talking with some of his students they said that by having been shown these examples they were able to make informed decisions for their own design work, and were able to take more risks and be more informative with their work because of the approach.

Judi Keith-Brown, Lecturer, School of Architecture

Through his involvement in the final year design course, Andrew has shown himself to be committed to the architectural design concepts of students, and encouraging of the development of structural ideas and knowledge within them. In applying his passion to student design work Andrew has been a well received member of the tutoring staff within the final year programme.

Six 2004 final year students, School of Architecture