Over the past few years, since I’ve started researching education, learning spaces and social education projects, my network has expanded exponentially. This was to be expected, considering how much time I’ve spent on various platforms trying to find out what is going on out there. Another thing that was expected was to see just how small the education circle really is. Everyone knows everyone in one way or another, or is just one degree removed from them.

In the beginning of my research, when I had just started my master studies at Aarhus Architecture School, I got in contact with Rosan Boschand her work at Vittra School at Telefonplan in Stockholm, Sweden. This is where I first got into contact with Jannie Jeppesen, then headmaster of Vittra Skolan, now head of of Rebel Learners.

An unexpected meeting on the subway

Rebel Learners is a new initiative created by Rektorsakademin Utveckling (RAU), who also arranges SETT, Scandinavia’s biggest education conference, and are the creators behind the podcast Skolsnack (School Chat) and Learning Narratives, a new game developed to build future learning environments.

The short version is that Rebel Learners is a course for teacher-students developed by teacher-students to upgrade and gain knowledge that they feel that they are not learning at their current institutions.

Rebel Learners came about after Fredrik Svensson, former principal and now CEO for RAU, met a former student of his on the subway in Stockholm. She told him that she was studying to become a teacher, but that she wasn’t satisfied with the education she was receiving from the university. None of her teachers were actively working outside of the university world, which left her feeling that they were lacking the sort of practical knowledge that she was going to need when she started working.

Sweden has a lot of challenges ahead: Amongst others, the country will be 40,000 teachers short of its needs by 2020; in Stockholm alone, the amount of students will increase from 60,000 to 90,000 Moreover, people who decide to study to become a teacher often are looked upon as if they only chose their field of studies due to lack of any other decision.

Instead of complaining and whining about obstacles, RAU decided to do something about it, they created Rebel Learners as a way to bring a positive and professional voice to the discussion about education as well as to support and lift teacher students, and active teachers, with the help of a vast network of professionals and partners as well as courses, seminars and other events.

Co-creating an Plan of Action

In order to be able to pinpoint what was truly needed to lift this task, RAU gathered 12 teacher-students and together they created a game plan and a draft for what was to become a week long summer camp that took place in June 2014. From here on, there will be two seminars per semester and one summer camp each year.

When working together, they identified the three main subject that the teacher-students felt were the ones of most value, and that they felt they didn’t get enough knowledge about throughout their education. These three core problems were to become the main headlines for the summer course.

1) Leadership
2) Core Values
3) Digitalization in theory and practice

The next step was to figure out how to get the knowledge they felt they were lacking and to get other teacher students involved. In order to do this, they decided to create a four-day summer camp, tackling these three core subjects as well as laying a basic action plan for the fall of 2014 and spring of 2015. The summer camp ended up comprising 60 teacher students from various parts of Sweden, four leaders and nine experts.

It was important for the teacher-students that they would get tools, methods and processes that they could use in practice, and that they were introduced to these by people who were actively using them in the classroom on a weekly basis. The dream team that made it happen:
– Ann-Marie Korling (one of Sweden’s most famous teachers) – Language and the importance of using communication as to build good relations
– Frida Monsen – How the role of the teacher has changed
– Helena Kvarnsell – Work smart
– Jonas Monsen – Normcritical pedagogy
– Karin Nygard – Programming for younger children
– Marit Sahlstrom – Web-based learning for students sitting at home
– Markus Bergenord (Digitalista) Working with pre-school children using both worlds (digital and physical)
– Niklas Svensson – Relation and reality-based learning
– Pernilla Glaser – Reflection exercises

The students were tasked with applying the three core subjects in a discussion about teacher education, schools and Rebel Learners. By the end of the week the groups had produced a large numbers of movies, articles and other material relevant to the subject.

They Are Someone?

Word about Rebel Learners is spreading like wildfire both inside and outside the borders of Sweden. As I mentioned before, Rebel Learners currently consists of 60 students and four leaders, but this will change in 2015 when 100 more students and 14 leaders will join the original 64 Rebels. Other than that, various municipalities within Sweden are looking to become a part of the organization, and a second chapter will open in the south of Sweden in order to accommodate the demand for becoming a part of Rebel Learners.

When talking to Jannie Jeppesen, Ante Runquist was taking part of a workshop in Brazil regarding the future of learning and a municipality in Canada has been showing interest in the initiative.

As for where this will lead, only time can tell; naturally, it remains to be seen what sort of impact the Rebels will have on the future of our education system, how we view teachers and what role they will have in the future. But one thing is for certain: Instead of passing the buck on a problem, going “Why doesn’t Someone do Something about that?,” they have decided to be that Someone who does Something. All we can do is support teachers and teachers students as much as we possibly can. After all, being a teacher, and a good one of the sort, is one of the most important professions in our society.

(Published on core77.com 17th of July 2014)

For those of you who conduct interviews with a voice recorder, you know that the transcription is typically a slow step. If you’re lucky, the interviewee speaks slowly or spends a long time thinking before answering, and the transcription process only takes two or three rounds. This was not the case when it came to Natalia Ivanova: On the contrary, the words flow as quickly from her tongue as the movements that flow from her limbs. She has a fluidity and energy in her way of thinking that comes across in everything she does.

Ivanova is the founder of Hal X, a small indoor training hall for parkour in Copenhagen, and the coordinator of especially designed courses, where parkour is a force for positive change for youths.

Originally hailing from Russia, Ivanova speaks fondly about the memories she has of jumping from garage roof to garage roof in the oppressive heat during summers back home. She remembers how fun it was to run as fast as she possibly could, in bare feet on the burning hot rooftops. Jumping over the gaps between the buildings, she knew that one misstep could mean an unpleasant tumble into rubble that might contain rusty scraps of metal, crushed glass and used needles.

Needless to say, this love for exploring urban spaces and challenging herself with her surroundings has been the defining element of through life. As a child, the hijinks and hyperactivity were just called “fun”; now it’s called “parkour,” and it has spread around the globe with the help of aficionados and YouTube like wildfire.

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However, you may not realize that—beyond the physics-defying wow factor of the sport—parkour can serve as a positive alternative to destructive social cultures. In contrast to several other street activities, the philosophy behind Parkour is not only to challenge yourself and push boundaries, but to develop the best version of yourself. You have to have a totally clear mind if you want to be able to get the most out of your practice. That means little or no alcohol, drugs or cigarettes. If you are under any kind of influence, you risk not being able to judge distances properly and having a serious accident. “Alcohol and other substances are off the table since your mind has be clear and focused for practice.”

Observers who aren’t familiar with the sport and the philosophies behind it might see nothing more than loose-limbed young folks jumping from building to building, doing double backflips and hanging from rails, which might lead one to the conclusion that these people are more than a little bit crazy. But as with any sport, parkour practitioners—known as traceurs or traceuses—must train extensively, with utmost dedication, and exercise discipline on every level of their life in order to do what they do. You will never see a traceur leave empty bottles or discarded sandwich papers smeared in mayonnaise behind—they don’t want to mess up their surroundings, their space for practice.

Ivanova shines when she talks about space and her way of perceiving it; she revels in interesting angles on buildings and cherishes spaces that we walk past everyday and never really notice, where she can practice in for hours on end. She talks about an spot high-up on a building and how she wants to figure out a way to get up there. The city is her playground, and everything from a bench to a set of walls can capture her interest.

She has managed to incorporate this passion for Parkour and the underlying principles in a rather innovative way. In addition to being the woman behind Hal X, Ivanova is also teaching parkour in collaboration with various partners as a way to prevent vandalism in schools and to help kids with autism interact with one another and the world.

Before studying at Paul Petersen’s Physical Education Institute in Copenhagen, she was a social worker who specialized in physical education, helping kids with troubled backgrounds. Back then, she couldn’t help herself from using Parkour as a tool to bring out new sides in the kids she worked with, nor has she been able to help herself from doing it in various ways since. The difference between now and then is that Ivanova has learned that the various ways she was working with the students were grounded in theories such as ‘Appreciative Inquiry’ and the ‘SOS Method.’ This discovery not only confirmed that she was on the right track, it also gave her a basis to continue her work. She knew parkour was a good way to work with kids at a level on which she could truly reach them and now she could explain and make others understand why.

After Ivanova completed her studies, she could have just gone the safe route, becoming a conventional teacher who activates kids in various ways, but instead she chose to focus on parkour and let everything revolve and develop around that.

The success of Ivanova’s various projects has spread through word of mouth to the extent that she is typically working five to ten different projects at any given time. A few of these projects are in the development phase, some are being executed, and others, such as Hal X, are regular gigs. This means that she doesn’t really have to go out and find clients, but that the clients come to her with a problem and they figure out a way to reach the goal together.

One of these projects came to her by way of a Danish insurance company that was working with schools around the country. The goal with the project was to stem the vandalism of schools, which was costing them obscene amounts of money. They were looking to address the issue by introducing a new social trend in the schools, to make it uncool to deface the school grounds, and Ivanova was tasked with figuring how to do so.

Her solution was to present parkour in such a way that the students started to interpret everything in the schoolyard as a tool for practice. She challenged the students to figure out various ways to use the benches, the corners, the stairs and other areas of the school grounds for practice. This made them perceive space in a different way and ultimately think twice about smashing bottles and burning the bleachers, because if their activity space was littered with trash or smeared in grease, they could no longer be used for training.

Every new client brings new challenges, new possibilities and new knowledge to be acquired.

PART II

(Published on core77.com 18th of July 2014)

In part one of this two-part series, we introduced Natalia Ivanova, educator and founder of the Hal X parkour training center in Copenhagen; as a passionate traceuse, or parkour practitioner, she has long incorporated physical education into her work with children. Here is a more detailed outline of her method.

Implementation

Getting the kids involved and excited about a new project is normally never an issue—they are more than happy to get out of their routines and try something new. Seeing as this is the case with most projects, the challenge is to make the project become a part of the everyday culture, to ensure that the students continue to practice after the official project is over and Natalia and her crew leave the school. Unfortunately, she has yet to come up with an answer… so No, no formula to be found here. At least not yet.

(When working with co-creative processes at various schools, my colleague Heidi and I encountered the exactly same problem. No matter what approach we tried, we never really managed to implement the way of thinking and working we used when collaborating with the students and teachers in such a way that it became a part of their everyday culture.)

Breaking Down Borders

No matter how much we try to ignore it and think or act otherwise, the fact remains that we live in a system where the gaps between the various social classes are visible to the naked eye. Just as with other sports, parkour is a means of breaking down these imagined barriers and connecting people from various cultures and social groups

Parkour transcends these social borders by creating a common ground—wall, ledge or bench—for participants.

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The Best Version of Yourself

Some call it mindfulness, others meditation, parkour practitioners just seem to call it preparation. Cleaning the soles of your shoes, moving your neck from side to side, stepping inside of yourself while warming up your joints, jumping up and down, visualizing the site and its various possibilities.

While the general public may have the impression that people who do parkour are just mad, jumping between building and doing double backflips, many people don’t realize that traceurs practice year-round. No matter how dangerous a technique might look, they have no intention of pushing themselves so far that they get hurt. Injuries are inevitable in any sport, but with practice and incremental improvement, traceurs can keep the risk to a minimum. Another thing that doesn’t mesh with their way of living is a large consumption of alcohol and other nefarious substances. The potential harm to their only required tool—their body—is far too great to justify. The point is movement, after all.

One of the things Ivanova has pointed out many times throughout the interview is that “there is always something you can do.” If you can’t jump 1m, then jump 50cm, if you can’t do that then jump 30cm and if you can’t jump at all, then train your upper body.

Moreover, the mental strength that one builds through parkour may have a positive impact on other parts of his or her life. Benefits may include: the propensity to look at situations from different angles to find a way to get from A to B; the practice of challenging yourself and pushing your limits when you feel the time is right; the habit of seeing possibilities where other see nothing; and the method of supporting and encouraging peers through struggle and in victory.

The Community

As an outsider looking in, it’s impossible not to notice—and envy—the camaraderie between people practicing parkour. The smiles, the pat on shoulder, the shouts of encouragement and kudos, the curiosity when someone does a maneuvre that others have yet have to master, and how everyone gladly supports and teaches one another. There is no talk about gender, country, culture, age, education, background, language or social layers. And if you, like myself, am curious about what they are up to, they are more then happy to show you some techniques and just or just sit down and give you an insight to what they are up to and what it’s all about.

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The Next Generation

Outsiders look at parkour and assume that the sport is driven by a distinct lack of mental stability. Looking at some of the appalling videos you can find on YouTube, I don’t blame them. Some of the jumps and maneuvers you will see can make you hold your breath and make your heart skip a beat… or five. Yet the movements continue to evolve and some of the techniques that were earth-shattering a few years back are now seen as standard inventory.

The trend of filming more and more courageous and dangerous routes is cause for concern among some of the more experienced traceurs. They are worried that the new generation will forget the principles behind the sport, that which holds the community together and drives its progress. Principles such as ‘practice makes perfect,’ ‘warming up’, ‘mental awareness,’ ‘taking things at your own pace’ and ‘supporting one another through thick and thin.’

In an effort to prevent this you can now find videos showcasing the small things that make a big difference, such as simple, progressive warm-ups and mindful training.

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Questions? Comments?

Now that you have a sense of what parkour is about, we’re curious to hear what you think…
– What sort of social problems do you you encounter in your surrounding?
– Do you think parkour could be a way to solve these problems? If so: How?
– How do you create lasting change when a project is over?
– How do you suggest we create a stronger connection and bigger understanding between parkour practitioners and the general public?

Schools kill creativity. This simple message was the point of Sir Ken Robinson’s TED talk, now the most viewed of all time. Robinson challenges the way we view education in todays society, and highlights the fact that it hasn’t developed in the speed that it needs to, but is stuck in the old way of thinking.

The talk was released in 2006. And while much has changed since then (how many of you are now reading this on a smartphone or a tablet?), our schools have remained dully familiar. In the UK, things have arguably got worse, with unpopular figure Michael Gove damning progressive education as a ‘misplaced ideology’ and swinging the curriculum back towards good old traditional methods.

Four students at Royal College of Art in London have decided to do address this issue by developing a summer program where kids can enjoy thinking and learning in different ways. Project 42 is expressly intended for creative learners (ages 9–12) who really don’t fit into the framework of today’s educational institutions. The program will take place between July 28 and August 8 at the Royal College of Art. WhyProject 42? Well, according to the one the founders, Ed Tam:

The name is inspired by the book The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. In the story, a supercomputer was tasked to find the ultimate answer to life, the universe and everything. Millennia had passed and the computer came back with the answer 42. But the people soon realized that it’s going to take a much bigger, more complex computer to arrive at the question. Project 42 was set up to help young people discover the power of the question.

The aim of the weeklong course is to bring out the fearless learner within each child by encouraging them to explore a question that interests them, and by starting with their strengths and working outwards. The theme for this year’s camp is London 2050, and under four themes—fashion, food, habitat and transport—children will be able to explore potential futures for the city through drawing, cooking, sewing, animating, storytelling, making and even coding.

The entire process will be available open-source: Project 42 will be documenting and sharing all of their experiences, methods and outcomes for others to adapt and use.

True to the principles of empathic design, the project has been developed organically, in collaboration with kids, parents, teachers and current experts in the field. Besides Sir Ken Robinson’s powerful talk, the project also bears the legacy of influential educational thinkers such as John Dewey and Lev Vygotsky. Other sources of inspiration include the Independent Project, Sugata Mitra and Logan LaPlante’s talk on Hackschooling.

I will be following the project and the team from London, which means that you’ll be able to read about the project as it unfolds. You can follow it here on Core77 and on Project 42’s own blog.

The MoHo Process Kit for the design of learning environments contains various tools and equipment that make it possible to design processes involving the users. In the kit you amongst others find; process plans which can be used as guides through the planning of the overall process, collection of examples, showing different ways to build processes, method cards with descriptions of various exercises and assignments and props, supporting the exercises. A summary of the kit contents can be viewed below.

Who is it addressed to?
MoHo Process Kit is designed for designers, teachers, schools and architects to focus on the interaction between learning environments and the pedagogical approach.

What is co-creative processes?
A process consists of a series of sequences that relate to each other and generates new knowledge along the way as the process unfolds. The more sequences, the more resources are required. The co-creative process is focused on creating as a team. The  focus on learning environments means that the participants get involved in the development of the physical environment, to improve the quality of the final solutions.

What is the purpose?
Involving users can produce outputs at two levels:

A) Ownership of the project.
B) Democratic processes where the context is a an fundamental parameter.

You can choose to focus more on one level than the other. you have to make sure that the users know the frame so they do not experience breach of trust during the process. If you choose to focus on B, where the users are involved in the development, you will normally embrace A as well. However, one should expect that this type of process is more resource intensive than the former.

When is it an advantage?
By involving the people using the space on a day-to-day basis it’s easier to focus on the interaction between the pedagogical approach and the physical environment and thereby qualify the design. You can work with co-creative processes when new schools are being designed, and old ones being renovated and upgraded. The framework focuses on enhancing the play between architecture and pedagogy and makes it clear to see how the co-creative process can be a part of a transformative process of change in which schools become wiser about their values and visions and what requirements it imposes on the learning environments.

How to design co-creative processes:
Processes can vary a lot, it all comes down to scope, duration and to what extent you wish it to effect the building. First you should carefully consider the goal of the process, and then decide what kind of involvement is optimal. You must also know what resources are available, then the process can be adapted accordingly. When the process is designed it is important to involve users only to the extent it is needed, this makes the process more targeted and overall more effective.

How to use the kit:
In the kit you will find different tools and props to help you get started with designing co-creative processes. It is important that you familiarize yourself with the materials and get your own experience. The various tools and props must be adapted to the process you decide to work with. It is important that you relate to the goal and the users. The answers you seek can be found in many different ways – just make sure to find a method that suits the targeted audience. Make sure to make your own reflections along the way, thus you can easily adjust the process next time you design a course.

This is the third article in an ongoing series about working with kids by Copenhagen-based architect/designer/educator Moa Dickmark. Her last article was on the Future of Learning Environments.

There are a few things that one should think about when it comes to working on a project using co-creative processes. There are the basics, such as how you develop and structure them, and then there’s the small things that make the process go more smoothly. Sometimes these small things end up making a big difference, so I’m going to let you in on some of the ones that my colleague and I use more or less every time we are out working. Most (but not all) of them are applicable also when working with teachers, leaders, politicians etc.

The Necessities

Start the process with a few meetings with the headmaster and school leadership, where you can decide on a common goal and make sure that you are on the same page. A goal for a process can be something along the lines of:

Develop spaces that students and teachers feel comfortable in and that can be used in various ways depending on subject and the individual students needs.

Decide on a timeline, a budget, how many hours you will spend with the students per workshop and ask them to find a class with teachers that are open-minded and up for the project. No point in hitting your head against the wall with teachers who don’t want you to be there; the students will probably take on the sentiment of teacher and the process to reach the set goals will not be enjoyable for anyone.

Involvement

1.) Make sure that everyone involved in the project feels like they are truly a part of the project, and that they have an important role in the process and outcome.

When working with students, invite their parents for a meeting where you tell them about the project, tell them a bit about the basics of co-creative processes and what sort of things their kids are going to come home and ramble about. It’s really good to let them try what you are talking about, so let them do one of the exercise—i.e. a quick and dirty model-making session always bring out a lot of laughter—in order to provide a greater understanding of how fun it can be, and so they have something to talk about when their kid comes home from school.

This is also a good way to get them more involved—maybe one of the parents works at a warehouse and can arrange some sponsorship deal with the boss or something of the sort, or that some of them want to spend some of their free time helping out at one of the workshops. The more support you get from the parents, the better.

2.) Also make sure that people who are not directly involved of the project feel welcome.

For example, shortly after starting working with a 6 grade class in a small school in the middle of Jylland, Denmark, the biggest ambassadors for the project and for what the students were working on turned out to be the librarian and one of the cleaning ladies. They showed parents what their children were up to, and talked about the vision developed for the various areas.

All on the Same Level / Experts in Their Own Right

No matter who you work with, be it a class of 7-year-olds, a class of 17-year-olds, a bunch of teachers, the school administrators or a mix of all of them, always remember to make sure to listen to them and and take them seriously. Whoever is a part of the project team is an expert in his or her own right, so when working with co-creative processes, no one’s opinion is more worth than anyone else’s. A 7-year-old girl’s opinion about the learning space is just as valuable as that of her teachers and headmasters; make sure that this is clear when you start working together, and that it is respected throughout the process. Make sure that no one plays the seniority card to get her/his way…

Overview

Design an overview of the process and the various workshops. Explain the overall goal with the process, and the goal for each workshop—but not the details—to the students and teachers in the beginning of the first workshop. Draw them on the whiteboard with figures (cameras, maps, tools etc) representing each workshop. It’s good if you do this in the beginning of each workshop—that way, they will have a visual understanding of what is going on, and will be able to see where in the process they are, what they have been through to get there and what they have to look forward to.

Language

Everyone has an opinion of their surrounding, but not everyone has the language to express it. Students and teachers will find it difficult to express why a certain area is good, and why another one isn’t. It is your responsibility to help them develop a better understanding of their surroundings, and a way for them to express it, and it is your responsibility to make sure you get the information you need, and to make sure that the students and teachers participating in the workshops learn from them, and find them interesting to take part of. This wa,y no one feels like they are wasting their time and everyone works a bit harder to reach the set goals. It also creates a great positive energy that spreads like wildfire around the school.

When working with students, no matter what age, never ever use oversimplified language. Continue using words such as design process, co-creation and modules. Write them up on a section of the white-board, you can call it “The dictionary,” and then explain what it means using words that already are a part of their vocabulary.

By the end of a workshop, you might hear a student say to another student something along the line with “Oh, but this is not the finished product, it’s just a prototype of the modular system we are working on…” When that happens you will stop, listen and think to yourself, “Wow, so cool!”

There’s no Right or Wrong

Another thing that is good to think about is to tell the students when you start working with them that:

There’s no right or wrong! If you want to write down your idea, write, we don’t care about the spelling, or grammar for that matter. If you want to draw down your idea, draw. If you want to build your idea, we are going to do that too!

What at your age is called Fantasy and Imagination is called Creative Thinking later on, and is something older people go to university to learn more about. So don’t lose it, you will need it now and for the rest of your life!

Teams

When designing the process focus on teamwork. Make sure that they vary in size in the very beginning; depending on how many students you are working with in total, you can make them bigger. We have found that the magical number is 5–8 people in one group. It’s better with more teams than bigger teams. During the first few exercises, you will be able to see how they work in teams: which ones work more closely; who naturally becomes a leader and who takes the leader role by force; who is a good project manager or creative thinkers; who brings positive and productive energy to the team; and who simply can’t work together. Try to get them to reflect upon this in various ways so they are more likely to develop good team by themselves later on in the process.

And then you have the ones that just don’t seem to fit in—or in some cases don’t want to fit in—to any sort of group. It is your challenge to figure out what sort of role they can play in process. Maybe they can be the Journalist, create a blog for the project, take pictures, do interviews with teachers and their fellow students, and write articles for each workshop. Or maybe they can be your personal assistant, or the shoulder-tapper, the one who goes around and gives high-fives, tells the other students how good they are and gives them positive reinforcement, it’s an important task too. Just make sure that no one is left out.

In the spring of 2012 MoHo participated in the development of a new piece of furniture for intermediate schools. The workshop resulted in a great span of ideas that resulted in iMoLearn, an artefact designed for active learning. MoHo’s role was to facilitate the 1st big workshop, and later on to be co-developers of the concept in collaboration with a wide range of partners, Spinderihallerne, Kolding Komune, SDU and Vanerum SIS, and to facilitate the internal development team.

The participatory workshop in Spinderihallerne in Vejle in January 2012 included 80 children aged 11-13 participated along with 20 teachers.