Education Trends for the Upcoming School Year: 2024-2025

The field of education is constantly evolving as we watch educators adapt their classrooms to meet the needs of students and their varied learning styles. For the upcoming school year, we have identified five trends affecting how educators are creating more inclusive and effective spaces for all learners.  

Accommodating Neurodiversity

Neurodiversity describes any person with atypical neurological patterns in thought or behavior, including Autism, ADHD, and Dyslexia. It is estimated that 15% to 20% of the population is considered neurodiverse; that is nearly 1 in 5 kids. However, because better methods for learning for these students are still being studied, schools often do not have adequate accommodations to support neurodiverse learners.

With that, we can expect to see educators focusing more on how to best aid neurodiverse students. Administrators and teachers can do this by creating psychologically safe environments in their classrooms. 

The traditional classroom setting, where each student is confined to a small desk or working space, restricts movement and is outdated. When students are separated from their peers, it is harder for them to work together, and students may feel isolated. Neurodiverse learners can struggle with focus and the traditional classroom setup does not make this easier for them. 

Moving away from this closed-off layout, schools should aim to include more collaborative spaces for learning as well as more comfortable classrooms by incorporating elements like flexible seating and unique classroom layouts. By doing this, schools will not only help neurodiverse students, but all students. When students are free to move around, they are more engaged and retain more of what they are learning. 

Collaborative Learning 

In the traditional classroom, a teacher will lecture students as a whole class and individual instruction is not prioritized as students largely outnumber instructors. With this lecture method, students are only given one choice as to how they can learn, which can only favor a few students, leaving the rest of the class unable to learn in accordance with their preferred learning styles. This year, we will see a major shift toward a more open learning model to best support students’ individual learning styles.  

In recent years we are seeing more of an acknowledgement that learning takes many forms; there is not just one way to go about it. One way schools can allow students to discover what works best for their individual personalities is by moving away from lectures and toward a collaborative learning model, which focuses on small group exploration more than formal instruction by one teacher. 

Letting students approach new topics in groups engages them and encourages them to process and synthesize information and concepts, rather than simply memorizing pieces of information. Collaboration also puts more emphasis on problem solving and active learning than traditional lectures.  

With collaborative learning, students learn important organizational skills, responsibility, and self-discipline. Especially now, as businesses highly value the development of strong soft skills on top of traditional hard skills, allowing students to develop cooperation and leadership capabilities in the classroom is more important than ever. In addition to developing these soft skills, students will also be able to grow through being exposed to diverse viewpoints and will become more comfortable facing constructive criticism from peers. 

Hybrid Learning 

Since the pandemic, all schools have had to at least try remote learning methods. As the stay-at-home orders move farther in the rearview mirror, some schools find themselves opting for the hybrid model, where students attend school both face-to-face and remotely despite it being safe to return to in-person school in terms of pandemic levels. 

The typical hybrid school offers about 25% to 50% of their instruction face-to-face, with the rest being either online or independent. However, this is not always the case; hybrid schools can take many different forms. For example, San Francisco Flex Academy, a high school in San Francisco, has a particularly unique hybrid model. At SF Flex students do not travel from class to class on a set schedule as is the case in most schools. Instead, students report to the school that resembles a large office space more than a classroom and they get to work in their individual cubicles.  

There, they get through their coursework independently or in small groups while an “academic coach” monitors the room and answers questions as needed. If necessary, students can receive instruction from small-classroom teachers. With this model, students control the timeline at which they learn; they can take their time with concepts that are more challenging and go at their own pace, and they are able to select how to tackle new material in a manner that suits their strengths.  

SF Flex is just one example of how hybrid learning can work. The beneficial part of hybrid learning—apparent no matter the model—is that students can tailor their learning to their levels of understanding and interests. 

In 2024, we expect to see more schools experiment with the mechanics of a hybrid classroom model to allow students to explore their interests and tailor their learning to what works best for them. 

Outdoor Education 

When students spend 90% of their time indoors, there are considerable negative effects on their mental and physical health and wellbeing. 

A study on over 200 sixth graders who attended elementary schools with an outdoor educational program found that students who can regularly learn outside the classroom in nature show significantly higher skills in cooperation and conflict resolution. 

In addition, students who learn in classrooms that incorporate nature and plants are more motivated in their learning and perform better overall. As found in a study conducted by Craig Gauden Davis Architecture, students who are instructed in classrooms with biophilic design earn math test scores that are more than three-times higher than those in traditional learning spaces (Determan, et al.). 

Outdoor learning areas can enhance students’ ability to focus and encourage creativity. Studies also show that nature can promote parasocial behavior, benefiting students beyond the classroom.  

The benefits of spending time outdoors are plentiful; they include: 
  

• A decrease in sedentary behavior 
• Better physical motor skills 
• Improvements in balance, coordination, and muscle strength 
• Improvements in impulse control and intrinsic motivation 
• Improvements in the immune system/better infection mitigation 
    

In addition, spending time in nature has been shown to improve attentiveness and decrease anxiety levels in children. In 2024, educators will move some instructions outdoors to better their students both inside and outside the classroom. 

Environment 

“Students are taught by more than just the teacher. They are also taught by their environment.” – Meridith Williams, Principal of North Rowan High School in Spencer, N.C. 

Because the average student is in school for about 1/7 of their awake time before they turn 18, it matters that the classrooms where they learn and play are inviting and comfortable. Reimagining traditional learning spaces to be more fluid and welcoming greatly benefits students. Non-traditional classroom spaces that allow for flexible seating will lead to non-traditional lessons, which are shown to have far more benefits for learners. In fact, on a study done on 153 classrooms and over 3,000 students across the UK, it was found that 73% of the students’ math progress was attributed to classroom design, specifically the flexibility allowed by fluid classrooms. (Barett, et al.). 

When classroom design considers factors like natural light, student-centered shared areas, and open-concept spaces that do not close off students, considerable effects to student achievement will be observed. Especially for children who are neurodiverse, natural lighting can increase engagement and productivity. In addition, the incorporation of greenery and visually appealing color palettes in classroom décor can make students feel more comfortable in their classrooms, which will allow them to be more engaged in their lessons. In 2024, we can expect educators to start to consider how their classroom environments are affecting the way their classrooms are run, and to update them to benefit their students. 

How Can We Help? 

At Ghent, we specialize in making innovative products that support visual communication and collaboration. Many of our products can be used in the classroom to facilitate the ideas listed above. 

Control Shelving Unit 

To support neurodiverse students, our Control Shelving Unit can help create a change of scenery. Control, although its primary function is to serve as additional storage, can function as a divider to separate large spaces into smaller, more manageable zones. The PET acoustic panels provide privacy and can reduce sound in noisy classrooms to help prevent distractions, which is crucial for aiding neurodiverse students in focus. Incorporating Control into classroom design, whether to create a quiet reading nook or to dampen classroom noise, will hopefully limit distractions and help students, especially those who are neurodiverse, to focus. 

Nexus Collection 

Our award-winning Nexus Collection was designed to facilitate collaboration across various situations. In a classroom setting, the Nexus Collection can help facilitate the collaborative learning strategy described earlier. With the Nexus Tablet, students will be able to work together with a uniting writing surface to brainstorm and record ideas, which can then be shared with the class by using the x-pegs to connect the Tablets onto the Nexus Easel. Educators can teach full class lessons on the Nexus Wallboard, or even with the Nexus Easel. Every piece within the collection can be used to communicate information to students or to creatively solve problems. 

Preserve 

The Preserve Outdoor Collaboration hub is perfect for learning outside of the classroom. Preserve, although available in many assorted styles, features an especially durable 4 x 6’ laminated glassboard, perfect for hosting lessons outdoors. Preserve is a permanent installation made to withstand harsh weather conditions and comes with an awning to reduce glare and ensure a comfortable experience for learners. 

Floor Partition 

The Floor Partition is among one of our most versatile products, especially considering how it can be used in education. The floor partition can be arranged in more than 2.5 million combinations to separate spaces. Using the floor partition, you can create privacy in large spaces, which are trending as far as classroom design goes. Our floor partitions can be ordered in a one-, two-, or three-panel design, each panel with a different surface: dry erase, acoustic PET, acrylic, cork, vinyl, fabric, or high-pressure laminate.