Labs in Learning

By 2001 PAL had tested Labs in arts-related disciplines, digital technologies and science. We began to speculate what might happen if people in the education sector had time and space to work with artists, scientists, technologists and designers.

Could PAL design a space for experimentation in policymaking, management, teaching and learning? And, most importantly, could the Labs give participants renewed confidence in their creativity which would lead to better decision making and improved formal and informal learning for young people?

Since then PAL has run 24 Labs involving 500+ teachers, teacher educators, youth workers, policy makers, curriculum specialists, artists and scientists. Residential Labs have been from one to seven days long to accommodate people who find it difficult to be away from their workplace for more than a few days. Typically a five-day residential Lab would be followed, some months later, by a non-residential review.

The Labs have been tailor made for trusts, foundations and public sector bodies who share PAL’s conviction that policymakers’ and teachers’ creativity is essential if young people are to become imaginative and creative and to love learning for its own sake.

What have we found out?

• Teachers, policymakers and others in formal and informal education are looking for opportunities to challenge what they know, take risks and try new, imaginative approaches to their practice

• Teacher education is often about requirements for subject and curriculum content, assessment and classroom management. PAL doesn’t discount these but they need the complement of a deeper, exploratory experience of learning which is personal and transforms people

• PAL’s work has been independently evaluated. Findings describe the co-constructed learning which takes place and the powerful impact on teachers, people in informal education and young people.

• The Lab impact has been enduring; even after eight years those who took part in PAL’s early Creative Science Teaching Labs are telling us of improved test results and inspections


• Lab participants tell us that their new-found creativity is resilient, they are tenacious and patient as they see their work through a different lens

• Artists, scientists, teachers and policymakers love to work with each other, trouncing the stereotype that creativity is only an artistic trait. They all have different ways of managing the decisions, challenges and ambiguities which they face every day.

The Future
Many people who have taken part in PAL Labs have gone on to use the methodology in activities with their peers; others have become Lab Directors themselves.

Over the years, we have endeavoured to make PAL Labs available to more people through shorter and/or non-residential Labs. It could be distributed through regional centres or networks, for example. This requires more investment by those in authority in Lab programmes and individual participants.

Critical Mass
PAL Labs are also delivered intensively to create a critical mass. In the East Midlands PAL is working with Ignition* in a three-year programme which is reaching at least 120 teachers, transforming their teaching of science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM). PAL is keen to build on its STEM Fluency Lab programme. [Read more]

PAL Labs make us confident that:

• We can move ahead of the current, welcome, curriculum reviews towards a new vision of imaginative, whole-systems learning

• The long-term impact of Labs on teachers’ resilience and learning will inform a new model of teacher education, at all levels

• Creativity should become a driver of all continuing professional development, from new entrants through to those with long years of experience

• Imaginative and creative teachers make a better and more enjoyable learning experience for young people

• Imaginative and creative policymakers make a better and more enjoyable learning experience for all

• An invigorated learning experience develops creative people and creative lifelong learners