The Lifelong Kindergarten group develops technologies and activities that engage people in creative learning. We’re exploring a few directions with our work in Africa:
1. Supporting creative learning across contexts
Instruction-focused learning and an emphasis on narrow outcomes continue to dominate formal and informal environments. As school systems seek to adapt to changes in technology, we’re exploring ways to support school systems, educators, and informal learning organizations in reconstructing outcomes and pedagogy that better prepare young people for lifelong, creative learning.
2. Creative Learning Communities
We’re exploring two kinds of communities in particular: (a) a maker-focused community that connects makers with employers while helping makers document and translate their skills to professional contexts and (b) supporting the development of creative learning communities—connecting individuals and organizations working to support creative learning in formal and informal learning environments.
Building on the work of Aprendizagem Criativa no Brasil (Creative Learning in Brazil—a decentralized network of educators, designers, systems leaders, foundations, and companies all involved in or hoping to support creative learning) and other initiatives, we hope to first gather stories of educators across a range of contexts, connect them with one another (including at the 2019 Africa Scratch conference), support co-development of resources, and hopefully engage in movement building.
3. Creative vocational learning
Vocational, 21st-century skills trainings are in high demand across the world—and especially in areas with high unemployment. Trainings tend to be dominated by traditional instruction and often limited to a particular set of skills. Moreover, while some of these trainings might help a student get a specific job or progress on a particular skill, they don’t prepare students for lifelong, creative learning—and the world that students will be entering.
In this environment, we’re exploring how to bring creative learning principles to the design and facilitation of “vocational trainings”—with the aspiration to create a model for more open-ended, playful, passionate, and peer-driven vocational learning that provides a springboard for lifelong learning.
We're piloting this work with the Mekatilili Initiative in Nairobi, Kenya.