SHAPING PATTERNS - cross-disciplinary perspectives on art and education for sustainability

The objectives of the Shaping Patterns project have first been to develop and provide concrete ideas and methods to impact on education for sustainability in a primary school context. Our aim was ...

The objectives of the Shaping Patterns project have first been to develop and provide concrete ideas and methods to impact on education for sustainability in a primary school context. Our aim was to support teachers in facilitating learning processes with children that examine the meaning of taking action and what our actions mean to others and the world. The implementation of the project has been based on the interdisciplinary collaboration between professionals from both primary education and the art and cultural field. The interdisciplinary perspective to education for sustainability has formed the fundament of the output development. In all aspects the project has been devoted to providing a space for empowering children to question and relate to the world of tomorrow through creative, experimental, and innovative approaches.

The project is rooted in the belief that art, culture, and creativity play a fundamental role in children’s everyday lives and education. The partners of the project are all working professionally with the facilitation of art and culture programmes in close collaboration with local communities, primary schools, kindergartens and after school services. The aims of the programmes are to provide new pedagogical and didactic environments that integrate art and culture-based activities. With a thematic approach to sustainable development, the project has explored the meaning and understanding of sustainability and the value of being connected to the world. Educating for sustainability is complex but necessary to integrate in children’s educational contexts. The Shaping Patterns project offers a new perspective to this need by sharing hands-on tools and inspirational material to work with sustainable subjects in primary schools with an artistic and cultural approach.

The project activities have led to the development of two main outputs: The Shaping Patterns Platform and The Shaping Patterns App. The platform presents a collection of resources and inspirational material that have emerged from the project partnership, incl. examples of inspirational practices, podcasts with chosen experts, model of collaboration, stories of involvement based on local programmes, the story and journey of the project’s travelling intervention, and a project documentary presenting the scope and actions of the project told by the project partners. The app is a hands-on interactive tool that can support teachers in educating for sustainability in a school context. The app is a selection of concrete experiments that can be done by children. The experiments are presented by the “Planet Earth”, and they all reflected in sustainable actions. The more experiments you, the happier the Earth gets.