Learnings from The Arlitt Studio Project

The Arlitt Center for Education, Research and Sustainability is part of the School of Education within the College of Education, Criminal Justice and Human Services at the University of Cincinnati. It houses the Arlitt Child Development Center, one of the oldest laboratory preschools in the nation. And, thanks to a collaboration between center staff and SHP, it now includes an experimental studio that transformed a dark, underutilized space to offer greater pedagogical benefits to the children and the teachers.

While most tend to think of studios as exclusively art-focused, the space was designed to accommodate a broader range of materials and experiences to enable children to express themselves in a whole host of different “languages.” The studio signifies that the school values the potential of children, views them as complex and capable, recognizes that there are ways to teach using more than words and invites exploration and research.