acoustics

Creating a calmer teaching environment

The Becket School, a specialist Science and Humanities College in Nottingham, has moved into its new £25m, three-storey purpose-built site, having operated out of two sites more than a mile apart for the past three decades.

designers Horsley Huber Architects was to optimise acoustic performance across the learning environment. Acoustic ceilings were installed to help

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reduce reverberation time and promote speech intelligibility. The ceilings, from Saint-Gobain Ecophon, also help to absorb unwanted noise from busy corridors which can often be disruptive to quiet classrooms.

Concentration

“Many educational premises in the UK suffer from poor acoustics but don’t recognise the severely detrimental impact on the educational development of

a balance between reverberation time, background noise and sound insulation

individuals and stress levels of teachers,” explains Colin Campbell, concept developer for education at Ecophon. “If teachers are inaudible and background noise is excessive it causes disturbance

ITH 1,050 PUPILS now enjoying more classrooms and more advanced facilities, a key requirement for

and those being taught lose concentration and cannot absorb information. “High noise levels can also mean teachers having to speak in a raised voice throughout lessons, putting stress on their health. Good acoustics help speech intelligibility which is crucial to both the learning and teaching process.” Neil Wright a teacher at Becket concurs: “The difference between teaching in the classrooms of the new building compared to the old buildings is phenomenal,” he says. “The new classrooms are calmer and teaching in them feels easier and less stressful, especially practical music lessons which was sometimes impossible in the old classrooms.”

Room styles

Meeting the design aesthetic was an equally important consideration for Horsley Huber Architects. To achieve this, it specified the acoustic ceilings in a range of styles. Focus E ceiling tiles were fitted in the classrooms for a clean look while the black, matte Sombra tiles were fitted in the drama classrooms. The ceiling in the dining room formed a series of facets around an external curved courtyard and was raked at a pitch of 20 degrees to follow the roof pitch. Focus E XL tiles were used because the larger tile size suited the space. Adding to its complexity, integrated radiant heater panels

“Often, where children seem not to be thriving in school, it is because they sit in an acoustic ‘dead spot’, where poor acoustics cause them to lose the ability to understand much of what their teacher is saying.”

Leonard Lunn, senior architectural technician, Horsley Huber Architects.

and two double-glazed roof windows per bay were also fitted in the ceiling. Finally, the tiles were tailor cut on site to suit each side of the formed facet lines. Ecophon used its Room Acoustic Comfort concept to evaluate the different room types and the activities that take place within them to create the acoustic balance. This is achieved by striking a balance between reverberation time, background noise and sound insulation to ensure the required sound is emphasised.

www.hhastudio.com www.ecophon.co.uk

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