Abstract:

This article aims to present and reflect on an experience teaching architectural design. Drawing from the author's involvement in the Architecture and Urbanism course at the Centro Universitário do Leste de Minas Gerais (UNILESTE/MG), Brasil, we will analyze and reflect on some didactic strategies applied and outcomes achieved in the teaching experience of the Studio 3 (E3) discipline in the third period of this course, spanning from 2002 to 2014.

Understanding that we currently live in a new form of societal organization closely linked to the process of globalization, we seek to demonstrate the importance of considering new guidelines for the educational system and architectural education. Based on Peter Scott's (2000) considerations on the "knowledge society," we understand that knowledge production in this contemporary context is not dominated and confined to communities of scientists but is embedded in an open and eclectic system where producers, users, and mediators blend. What is observed is a more excellent social distribution of knowledge, the appreciation of local, transdisciplinary, and heterogeneous knowledge, learning by doing, and personal knowledge.

The article proposes a critical analysis of specific processes and didactics introduced for architectural education in a new course located in a geographical periphery. It reflects on the adaptability in adopting pedagogical tools that value and recognize practical, empirical knowledge and local wisdom as elements in constructing knowledge related to architecture and urbanism.

As a case study, we use the teaching practices adopted in the housing design discipline (Studio 3). The intentions expressed in each of the proposed exercises in the discipline were analyzed, aiming to identify and evaluate the intended results and their impact on knowledge construction and student formation.

In conclusion, it can be considered that the didactic approach experimented at CAU-Unileste achieved noteworthy results deserving evaluation and consideration in discussions on the practice of architectural education, especially when considering the challenge of initiating an architectural debate in a particular context without a tradition in professional formation and inland regions of Brasil. The Studio 3 discipline incorporated innovative design tools for housing project conception and developed procedures and didactic instruments that value and recognize the importance of practical and empirical knowledge in identifying problems related to the teaching of Architecture and Urbanism.

Keywords:

Architecture Education, Project Education, Housing Design, Knowledge Society, Unileste-MG.