Creative Learning Experiences for Vulnerable and Marginalized Young People

• In Event: "STEAM" Programs: Equitable Approaches to Transdisciplinary Informal Environments

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this poster is to share research on how young people in informal learning environments use and learn from creative software production. The research aims to illuminate how creative learning experiences also develop STEM understandings in educational contexts explicitly serving vulnerable and marginalized young people, focusing on the role of STEAM programs in supporting young people failed by the school system to develop understandings of science and math through sophisticated technological use for art making. The study draws on a two-year ethnography of a music production course at an alternative arts NGO/college in London serving youth who are ex-offenders, expelled from other schools, or referred by government social services. Following students’ use of the Mac software program Logic to create music and learn music engineering, it found that the nurturing and free-form nature of the specific learning environment simultaneously fostered deep and transformative learning experiences for some students, while allowing others to fully disengage from participation.

Theoretical Framework: This study follows theories advocating rightful presence for young people historically denied entry into closed off spaces delineating whose voices and meanings are legitimated (Tan & Calabrese Barton, 2017), and also draws on ideas of how an ethics of care in education can contribute to building equitable futures in culturally diverse education contexts (Noddings, 2002; Langford, 2019).

Methods: The study used ethnographic methods of participation-observation and interviews, and also incorporated a co-participatory sound design intervention, which introduced students to unfamiliar music-making technology and allowed autonomous and unguided interaction.

Results: The study has found that STEAM education work focused on creative music can help to establish ‘rightful presence’ for minoritized and marginalized youth. It also has found that
school culture plays a critical role in generating buy in from students to participate in creative and co-designed approaches to learning. The ethics of care that underpin interactions between teachers and students, and the extended freedoms afforded to young people in the space to enact their own creative processes, appears to contribute to an environment that can support deeper learning. This suggests that creative digital arts education can act as a bridge to connect young people in precarious situations to promising and engaged futures in STEAM and STEM.

Scholarly Significance: The data collected thus far suggests that within informal learning contexts where creative engagement with technology is the focus, object-based learning (introducing intriguing, difficult, or complex hardware interfaces) can be powerful for deepening engagement in creative practice. However, the potential pedagogical innovation introduced in the study benefited from a class culture in which participants first expressed comfort and security about their engagement with new and different ways of sparking creativity through technology. These findings suggest that the arts can act as culturally-responsive curricula and spark critical consciousness, potentially creating pathways to encourage diverse student uptake of arts and design. However, while an ethics of care may have a role to play in facilitating deeper learning outcomes, the potential for such approaches to also contribute to increased disengagement warrants further study.

Author

• Sam Mejias, London School of Economics