The use of the classroom, i.e. the whole relation between the classroom, its arrangement and the conducted lessons, plays a rather subordinate role in empirical educational research. Rather, all the persons present are foregrounded in research on the everyday life at school as well as in the daily routine of school and classroom occurrences, whereas the surrounding classroom is neglected. Therefore, the first interest of this contribution centers on the questions of how teachers deal with room conditions, of how they position themselves in the classroom, of how they move through the classroom and of how the teacher’s body language, expressed therein, influences lessons. Secondly, this paper seeks to illustrate whether changes in classroom architecture (cf. Buddensiek 2008; Rittelmeyer 2010) affect the level of classroom activity (cf. Steele 1973; Weinstein 2007; Weinstein/Romano 2011). It further seeks to outline whether teaching changes when teachers are confronted with school spaces/classrooms changed according to their wishes, which is due to the fact that the classroom, as constructed environment, influences both the wellbeing and classroom activities (cf. Rittelmeyer 2010; Forster 1997).

In research on school and teaching, the teachers’ perspective is distinguished from the students’ perspective. Furthermore, the respective perception of classroom activity is monitored and its direct or indirect effects on the process of teaching and learning are described. Hence, to begin with, my contribution aims at outlining basic differences between the teachers’ and the students’ perspective on associations with space and classroom activities by referring to relevant empirical studies. This comparative analysis will demonstrate that the focus in current spatial-scientific research on school and teaching is placed on connections between school space and school culture (cf. Böhme/Herrmann 2009), whereas processes of classroom activity in connection with classrooms have been paid less attention.

The aspect of space, which is often discussed in phenomenologically informed pedagogy (cf. Westphal/Hoffmann 2007), is taken up, but is conceptualized against the theoretic background of research on school and teaching and enriched by empirical findings.

My paper compares studies of the uses of classrooms from Germany (cf. Forster 1997), Great Britain (cf Rittelmeyer 2010) and North America (cf. Weinstein/Romano 2011).

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