Head Space - Twinning and Mentoring Peer Creative Leadership Development - funded by the Creative Learning Network

This partnership project developed a self-sustaining cycle of professional development through collaborative creative practice. It supported creative approaches to leadership that empowered teacher agency, which in turn supported creative innovation in pupil-led curriculum design and delivery via:

Collaborate via Twinning:

• Twinned Dounby Primary School, Orkney and Allan’s Primary School, Stirling – at leadership, practitioner and pupil levels to share current learner-led practice. Dounby and Allan’s Primary School have both taken significant strides in the past work funded through Creative Learning Network and are beginning to develop their own processes. Both Orkney and Stirling are rightly proud of this practice and seek to develop it further.
• Delivered a pupil-led collaborative project that produces a short film to demonstrate practice by the pupils from both schools as a piece of co-creation. This required use of digital technology to communicate/create together, and shared responsibility of the project budget between staff and pupils.

Empower via Mentoring:

Each school then worked alongside another school in their own catchment area that is interested in beginning or developing their creative learning/leadership journey. In Orkney Dounby Primary School built a mentoring relationship with Eday Primary that is continuing in 2024-2025.

Embed via Analysing Progress:

• We undertook a short piece of comparative research by an external researcher to look at the different and shared processes that each school has adopted and adapted for their own needs.
• To disseminate an entry process into creative learning at other schools.
• To assess the outcomes of the programme through the Social Value Engine tool.