Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 2017 - Public - 47

lows all views, both 2D and 3D, to automatically update as changes are made, enabling designers to forgo
chasing said changes throughout their documentation.
Students get a more accurate idea of the end result and
can make informed decisions throughout their creative
process. A student can easily see if a change made in
one point of view is feasible and troubleshoot difficult
details that might not be visible in 2D.
From a practical standpoint, providing students
with the skills they need to work in a hybrid environment of 2D and 3D will help them save time and money, as well as compete against other designers in their
career. Educators can't embrace a 2D/3D hybrid workflow in a single lecture. Educators must implement 3D
design up front and throughout the syllabus, discussing
it lecture by lecture to get students accustomed to the
hybrid process. While numerous 2D and 3D designrelated software programs are available on the market,
Vectorworks enables students to work in 2D and 3D at
the same time.
FLIPPING THE CLASSROOM
Of course, the content of a lecture alone does not make
or break a student's education. How a classroom is utilized and arranged can have an equal effect on the way
a student acquires knowledge from the lesson, especially
when classwork is as individualized as within a design
course. Between classes, projects and jobs, time is an
invaluable resource to students that only grows scarcer
as they grow. Each educator must ensure they are using their own time, and their students' time, in the most
efficient manner. Recording lectures or posting them
online has long been a way to help students who were
unable to make it to class, as well as let other students
relearn at their own pace. Some claim this makes the
physical classroom irrelevant and allows students to
skip class and professors to forgo in-person meetings.
While in a traditionally framed course, these are drawbacks, a newer method, the flipped classroom, transforms a classroom into a better resource for students
than a place to sit and learn the basics. By separating
the classroom from the lecture and allowing students
to learn outside of physical meetings, that time in the
classroom becomes a place for students to explore under
the guidance of an instructor.
In a traditional setup, students learn the basics of
drafting and designing in the classroom, and then work
on assignments outside of class hours, typically while
they're at home alone. The flipped classroom concept,
in its most basic iteration, flips the roles of classwork
and homework, refocusing the classroom around the
student. Professors record their lectures and post them
online for students to view or have students read the
textbook before class. Time spent in the classroom becomes available for students to work on their projects.

The flipped classroom
concept, in its most basic
iteration, flips the roles of
classwork and homework,
refocusing the classroom
around the students.
Students are able to push themselves creatively and
technically under the watchful guidance of the instructor. Students can talk through, with professors and their
peers, concepts and designs they might have been unable to figure out on their own or were too afraid to risk
a grade on.
Flipping the classroom also gives students access
to their professors' immediate feedback on designs. Of
course, this could be achieved through office hours, but
not all students have the requisite free time to get the
individual attention they need. Further, the questions
they ask are more valuable in a classroom setting than
one-on-one. Other students, who might not have the
same question at that moment or are too shy to speakup, learn as well, and a professor avoids discussing the
same solution multiple times. By rearranging the way
time is consumed within a course and allowing students
to learn the basics of design and technical methods before coming into class, students get the chance to put
their own design development at the forefront of their
education, and the software becomes a tool rather than
a subject itself.
This classroom arrangement is especially useful for
beginning designers who are just learning the concepts
of a design software. In the flipped learning environment, they get to practice a hands-on workflow, while
engaging with their instructor and executing a concept
they learned before the start of class. The classroom environment is different as well. When using computers

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