en Architecture Architecture Research Paper Research Paper <p style="margin: 0px 0px 10.66px;">School environments are connected to children perceptions and emotions. The goal of this research is to explore children subjective perceptions of their school environment using &ldquo;Q-sort methodology&rdquo; as a unique method for environmental studies. This paper makes two main contributions. First, the research provides a study design to identify children&rsquo;s perceptions of school environment that propose new information about what children prefer and can be used in the design of school spaces by designers. Second, it evaluates Q-sort methodology for gathering data directly from children concerning about their perceptions and preferences to clarify their perspectives of&nbsp; the environment based on these objectives. The questions that this paper addresses are: 1- What environmental components in schools do children percieve positively and prefer? And, 2- How can research with children about their place perceptions using Q-sort? According to the purpose of the study, the respondents included 30 children (boys) from the first and second grade of two private primary schools in Kerman. The research, based on q-sort methodology, used interview as a tool for collecting data and discourse analysis for analyzing the data, and exploring the children&rsquo;s perspectives. The study revealed that children interpreted spaces psychologically and had positive perceptions of and preferences for informal, personal, hiding, cozy, home-like and playground spaces and so on, likely due to affording their psychosocial needs.&nbsp; The result shows that future school designs should explore strategies that use connections of physical and psychosocial characteristics of child&#39;s environments to foster positive experience and perceptions.</p> Child environment, Q methodology, Participatory method, School environment 184 197 http://ijaup.iust.ac.ir/browse.php?a_code=A-11-1677-1&slc_lang=en&sid=1 Fatemeh Sheikh Asadi fateme.sh.asadi@ut.ac.ir 180031947532846003480 180031947532846003480 No Faculty Member in Higher Education Complex of Zarand, Kerman, Iran Isa Hojat isahojat@ut.ac.ir 180031947532846003481 180031947532846003481 Yes School of Architecture, College of Fine Arts, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran