The room situation is really up to you. Either way you should be able to train him to be comfortable in his crate, REGUARDLESS of where his crate is. If your husband feels better having the dog near you when you sleep, then that may be in your room. If he doesnt care, then another room may work as well there. Although you should take into consideration that in the beginning, if the dog is able to see you he may whine more (since in the past it has worked to get him out). If he cant see you, it may help him with not whining. Then again, seeing you may make him more secure, as opposed to being alone in another room. You wont be able to know until you try. As he gets more comfortable in his crate and willing to sleep in it through the night, you can move it then with no problems. But remember, hes getting used to sleeping on your bed so if he sees your bed he may want to cry to get on it.
As far as sectioning off the crate, this is the fundamental principle behind crate training. If the crate is big enough, the dog will use one end to potty and sleep in the other end. A crate should be sized so that the dog has enough room to stand, lay down, and turn around in comfortably. You can probably give a couple more inches of freedom but large amounts of extra space may facilitate pottying IN his crate so keep that in mind. Dogs by nature do not want to soil where they sleep so when you confine the dog to a smaller space, they are forced to hold it until you let them out to go outside. (Unless like some of the dogs on here who pee on their bedding and then bunch it up in the corner of the kennel! lol)
Oh and if its easy for you, I would take out the section when training him to settle in his crate, but put in it at night when he sleeps or you leave him (for pottying purposes). But the extra room for him to get in and get used to it will probably help with training.
