Study Architecture 
ProPEL 
Author(s): Zhengping Liow
Despite growing awareness of design studios’ hidden curriculum and ambiguous design process as inherent risk factors that may negatively affect students’ development, the One-on-One (OOO) Master-Apprentice hierarchical pedagogical paradigm was largely unchallenged in design studios worldwide. This study investigates potential advantages of the Collaborative Cross-pollinative Team Learning (CTL) pedagogy in fostering academic resilience and improving academic performance. While the authoritarian approach of OOO Master-Apprentice might reduce students’ exposure to design setbacks, the CTL pedagogy focuses on heterarchical facilitation by tutors, subsequently promoting social support among peers. CTL engages students through a positively driven hidden curriculum in which tutors orchestrate design discussions towards inculcating collaborative mindsets. The peer-to-peer social support produced is suggested to instil students’ academic resilience, allowing them to bounce back from the ‘everyday setbacks’ as natural risk factors experienced in design studios. The longitudinal study used the Academic Resilience Scale (ARS-30) and academic score analysis to assess the impact of each pedagogical framework. Although there is no significant disparity in student resilience between the two groups, CTL students consistently outperform their OOO peers academically. The stability of academic performance can be attributed to the social support cultivated during their first year under the CTL pedagogy. However, the results reveal that the non-hierarchical studio pedagogy can significantly enhance student performance by recalibrating power relations and promoting psychological well-being through cross-pollination. Embracing collaborative learning environments challenges conventional educational structures such as OOO Master-Apprentice and prepares students for increasingly volatile and uncertain professional landscapes by fostering soft skills such as teamwork, communication, and academic resilience.
https://doi.org/10.35483/ACSA.Teach.2023.20
Volume Editors
Massimo Santanicchia
ISBN
978-1-944214-44-9
