In this episode Claire Bown is joined by Georgia Close and Harriet Body from the National Gallery of Australia, alongside Naomi Zouwer from the University of Canberra, to explore how the gallery co-designed its Creative Learning approach.

The conversation traces an 18-month process of articulating a shared pedagogical framework shaped by national context, cultural responsibility, and First Nations-led principles. Rather than adopting an existing model, the team worked through workshops, observation, interviews and iterative “campaigns” to develop a cohesive, values-led approach.

A key commitment was centring the artist’s voice, placing artist intention in conversation with students’ existing knowledge. From this, the team developed a Creative Learning strategy planning tool that supports inquiry-led, multimodal, embodied and reflective practice.

Across the episode, they explore:

1. How to develop a context-specific learning approach rather than importing a model
2. What it means in practice to centre the artist’s voice
3. How small, iterative “campaigns” can embed reflective practice in a team
4. How multimodality and embodiment deepen engagement beyond discussion
5. Why joy is understood as a serious pedagogical commitment
6. What co-design and participatory action research look like inside a museum setting

This episode will resonate with anyone working in museums, galleries or cultural institutions who is thinking carefully about pedagogy, reflective practice, and how to articulate an approach that genuinely reflects their context and values.

The Art Engager is written and presented by Claire Bown. Editing is by Matt Jacobs and Claire Bown. Music by Richard Bown. Support on Patreon

Episode Links:

https://nga.gov.au/learn/our-creative-learning-approach/

The Creative Learning Project Digital Publication: https://nga.gov.au/media/dd/documents/NGA_The_Creative_Learning_Project_Digital_Publication.pdf

Zouwer, N. & Hamilton, O. (2026). The Creative Learning Project: Defining the National Gallery of Australia’s Creative Learning Approach. 10.13140/RG.2.2.35063.28324

Zouwer, N., Hamilton, O., Menser Hearn, N., & Ali, I. (2026). Using Practice-Based Methods to Co-create, Define, and Articulate a New Approach to Art Education in the National Gallery of Australia. Australian Journal of Education, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/00049441261421257

Georgia Close, Head of Learning, National Gallery of Australia

Harriet Body, Creative Learning Convenor, National Gallery of Australia

Harriet Body on LinkedIn

Naomi Zouwer, artist, teacher, and researcher. Lecturer of Creative Arts Teacher Education and a researcher in the Centre of Advanced Education Studies (CASE) in the Faculty of Education at the University of Canberra.

Naomi Zouwer on LinkedIn

Naomi’s website https://www.zouwer.com/

The Centre for Advanced Studies in Education (CASE)

https://www.canberra.edu.au/research/centres/case

Show Links:

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Or pick up a copy of my book, The Art Engager, for step-by-step guidance on creating meaningful, interactive guided experiences https://www.theartengager.com/

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Hello and welcome to The Art Engager podcast with me, Claire Bown.

I'm here to share techniques and tools to help you engage with your audience

and bring art objects and ideas to life.

So let's dive into this week's show.

Hello and welcome back to The Art Engager podcast.

I'm Claire Bown, and today we're exploring how the National Gallery of

Australia co-designed its own creative learning approach shaped by its national

context, its cultural responsibilities, and the values of its learning team.

I am joined by Georgia Close and Harriet Body , both at the National

Gallery of Australia and Naomi Zouwer from the University of Canberra.

The Creative Learning project unfolded over a year and a half as

a collaboration between the gallery and the University of Canberra.

Through a co-design process involving the learning team and artist educators, the

team worked to articulate a shared vision for learning, define the commitments

that guide their work, and develop a creative learning approach supported by

a set of creative learning strategies.

In our conversation, we spend time with what that actually looked like

in practice, the workshops, the long discussions about language, the time

in what they describe as the 'messy squiggle', before clarity emerged, we talk

about positioning artists, educators as co-researchers in shaping the approach

and about the small iterative 'campaigns' that helped ideas to take root and to

build shared language across the team.

We also explore how the Art Through Culture, principles and

First Nations led work, shaped the foundation of the project.

Why centering the voice of the artist became a key strategy, and

how multimodality embodied learning, play and reflection are woven

into sessions and into practice.

And throughout we return to the role of joy, not as an extra,

but as part of the vision for relational and meaningful learning.

I hope you enjoy our conversation as much as I did.

Hello and welcome to The Art Engager Podcast.

Hello.

Hi.

Hello.

Now we have three guests here today.

So I'd love for you to introduce yourselves one by one.

Should we start with Georgia?

Thanks, Claire.

Um, my name's Georgia Close.

My role is head of Learning here at the National Gallery of Australia.

In our learning team, we, think about lifelong learning and our team

is divided into sort of three broad areas of education, public programs

and, and digital and outreach.

And now, I'm gonna go to Harriet.

Could you tell us who you are and what you do?

I'm Harriet Body and I am the creative learning convener

at the gallery, which means that I organize the development of creative

learning pedagogy, with the team.

And that means that, I see my role as really working in support of artist

educators and supporting them with their professional practice and the ways

that they do things on the floor and everything artist, educator related.

I'm there to support them in their work.

Brilliant.

And last but not least, Naomi.

Oh, hi.

I'm Naomi Zouwer.

I'm used to going last with the Z name.

Um, I'm a practicing artist and a researcher and a lecturer in

creative arts teacher education at the University of Canberra.

So welcome to the podcast.

I invited you all here today to talk about the creative learning project

at the National Gallery of Australia.

Now, this kind of long term, project, it set out to really articulate this

shared learning approach for the gallery.

And I thought it would be wonderful to invite you here to talk about

why this project felt necessary, how you went about doing it and

what came outta the process as well.

So let's start at the very beginning.

How did the idea for the Creative Learning project come about?

Well, thank you Claire.

The lead up to the project really began a few years ago, uh, when we embarked

on a project to create a framework for all learning at the National Gallery.

And this work was really undertaken with a view to understanding what

learning meant at the National Gallery, or what we understood by learning and

what our responsibility was to, um, a national audience of lifelong learners.

And so this work, which was led by Julia Mendel, our digital learning

manager, and Leanne Waterhouse, our education manager, it generated a

lot of discussion and thinking about our role as the National Gallery and

the values that underpin our work.

So a lot of this early work really informed the elements of our creative

learning approach, but the creative learning project itself came about

through a specific focus on the needs of our school audiences.

Um, so we've always had a really strong education program.

Each year we see about 50,000 or 60,000 students across our onsite,

online and offsite programs.

And we have a team of artist educators who work with us to deliver these programs.

But until this project we didn't, have a unified approach to guide the

experience of our learning programs.

And so in the absence of a defined pedagogical approach or even set

program frame frameworks, the content and experience of a school learning

program was largely determined by the individual educator, which

understandably resulted in varied and inconsistent experiences for schools.

So it became clear that we needed to determine an approach to teaching and

learning at the National Gallery so that we could provide clear guidelines

for our staff, but also clear expectations for our school's audience.

So we knew that we needed the following things.

We needed program frameworks that linked to the Australian curriculum

and that provided clear advice around learning outcomes, program content

and selection of artisan works.

We needed a defined pedagogical approach and also a shared language

to guide the types of learning experiences we facilitate and how

we engage with art and artists.

We also knew that we wanted to make a shift in the team to thinking about

what we do as creative learning and to bring more active engagement and space

for student voice in our programs.

We needed a robust approach that was informed by contemporary learning theory

and practice because the approach will also inform our learning resources

and our teacher professional learning.

And I think really importantly, we needed our team to, um, understand

the why of what we were doing.

So we had over a couple of years, I guess, been talking to our dear

colleague Naomi at the University of Canberra, and we'd been doing some

work with her undergraduate teaching students already at the gallery.

And so, um, as we'd been developing this relationship for some time, we knew that

we had shared values around creative learning, and it seemed natural to,

approach Naomi to do this work with us.

And so we embarked on this 18 month collaborative process

which Naomi will talk more about.

But I think it's important to acknowledge that

we weren't starting completely from scratch in this process.

We had two really important components of the approach already in place,

um, that provided really important foundations for this project.

The first of these was our commitment to First Nations learning, which has been

embedded in our programs through the gallery's Art Through Culture principles.

So the Art Through Culture principles provide a culturally responsive and

respectful framework for engaging with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art.

And these principles have been developed by First Nations educators at the gallery,

including, former team members, Crystal Hurst and Shane Nelson and our current

educators, Maggie Douglas and Noah Watson.

So the art through cultural principles were really important.

And the second really important element was our team of artist

educators and learning facilitators.

And these are creative practitioners who bring, skills and perspectives that

shape the experience of our programs.

A lot of reasons for starting this project together, but

that through line, I'm seeing, that bringing consistency and clarity to

an existing approach to teaching and learning across the gallery as well.

And I think a very important aspect that will be, um,

interesting for listeners as well.

And this podcast is listened to people, in over 60 countries, but why was it

important that this approach was developed specifically for the Australian context?

We know that there was a lot of approaches that already existed.

You know, there's visual learning strategies, object-based

learning, activity-based learning.

But a lot of these, approaches come from the Northern Hemisphere and we

realized that we needed to create something that was, you know, context

specific to the location in the southern hemisphere also in the nation's

capital, and as the National Gallery of Australia with the largest collection

of First Nations works in the world.

And also responsive to engage meaningfully with First Nations

people and culture of course, and the changing diverse student populations

that were coming through the doors.

So it was really important to stop and, and, uh, think about the National Gallery.

What was its remit and how could it best do it?

Also, as a leader, as the National Gallery of Australia it wanted to

lead the way in how we engage with young people in the art museum.

And going back to that First Nations led work, which I know

you've done in the past as well with the Art through Culture project.

So how did the First Nations led work kind of shape this project

right from the very start?

Well, I guess, um.

The key aspect of the archery culture was that it was a move away from colonial

interpretations of First Nations art.

So instead of applying those external frameworks or looking, coming at the

work through formal elements such as line and shape a big part of that was

starting with the artist intention, so the intentions of the work, and that

really impacted how the programs were being taught across all of the galleries.

So, I guess this positioning prioritizes really careful,

respectful and situated engagement.

And it requires more ongoing care and attention which results in

more meaningful engagement, I think, to the art and the ideas.

So you're looking more at the ideas of the work, the intention, rather than saying,

okay, well this is a great approach, let's just do this across the gallery.

It was really important to, to think about if we are looking at First

Nations work, we are always going through the artist's intentions.

Well, let's do this with everything, but let's be really careful and respectful and

go slowly and take our time to see how we can engage with works across the gallery.

Yeah.

So, thinking about the project itself and what was really unique about this

project was that there were so many voices involved in kind of shaping it

and coming together, this co-design that was very much a part of it.

So can you talk a little bit about the kind of collaborative

approach you took and why it was so important to work in this way

to develop your specific approach?

Well, I guess, you know, as Georgia mentioned, this work had

already started, you know, a while ago, but it's very rare for galleries

to be able to say, we have some time.

Let's just stop and take stock of what we are doing and, make

a research project out of it.

So it was really lucky that they could do that.

So all this work had been happening.

They made space and time to pick it up again and, and sit with it.

And they'd been testing out the Art Through Culture principles on the floor,

and they could see how these were evolving really nicely as they were being tested.

So it wasn't a kind of make something then apply it, it was

kind of a very iterative process.

And it was really important to look around and see all of the skills and the

different experiences that the learning educators or the artist educators already

had in the team and what they were doing.

It was really important that everybody felt that they contributed

to the development of the approach.

I think so what we did was we used this participatory Action

Research, approach and co-design.

So everybody was on board.

It wasn't about a top down model, it was more about a bottom up.

So it started with a survey asking, artist educators what they did and

how they did it and why they did it.

Just to see where people were coming from and what they were doing.

And then once we knew the lay of the land and what, what was going

on, we also did some observations so we could see it in practice.

And then we did a lot of interviews and some of the interviews were

one-on-one and some were group interviews, uh, where people talked

about, what was important to them and.

How they brought their work to their own work to the gallery and what

they wanted to see, what kind of pedagogical approach they'd like.

So we spent a lot of time listening and looking, observing.

And then the next part of it was, the really important part,

I guess, we did six workshops, so there would be full day workshops.

And because the artist educators are artists and the researchers,

we are artists as well.

So we used art-based methods to kind of unpack pedagogical strategies and

different ways of approaching looking at artworks that were going beyond

you know, just drawing, looking at a work and drawing it, because we

found that was problematic when we started looking at the Art Through

Culture principles, in practice.

So, how can we move beyond things like drawing?

How can we bring in different things that they were already doing, that

were identified through those surveys and interviews and observations, and

then kind of, narrow it down to a few and then give it some kind of form.

And in addition, so you had these six co-designed

workshops, which were like full day workshops, with everybody involved.

You also had practice-based 'campaigns' you called them in which you tested

emerging strategies and ideas.

Yeah.

So from the workshops, I should say that we didn't

decide, let's do six workshops.

In fact, I think we, we were gonna have four, but then we were like Georgia

was, maybe we need another workshop.

Maybe we need another workshop.

So we ended up with six because after each workshop we we realized that, oh, we

need another workshop that's specifically about something in particular.

So we were kind of responding to what the artist educated needed and what

we were seeing that was happening.

And before the workshops we'd give everyone readings or podcasts.

We gave them your podcast one time.

And so we were unpacking these kind of, uh, contemporary ideas on, on

art education in the museum, but also thinking through them in creative ways.

And through these workshops we'd also positioned the artist

educators as co-researchers.

And then the next step was for them to take these ideas and test them

on the floor like they had done with Art Through Culture principles.

They started testing different approaches on the floor and we call that 'campaigns'.

And in teaching language, it's probably called a teaching sprint.

But maybe Harriet could talk about the campaigns 'cause she really

managed the teams and decided which campaigns she would go with.

Yeah, so the campaigns are a really important part of educator

practice and they started out at the beginning when we were just in this

really messy kind of squiggle phase.

Naomi brought this idea of the research squiggle, which if

you can imagine a big squiggle.

And then outside of the squiggle there's a line that emerges out of the squiggle.

And we kept saying to people, we are inside the really messy squiggle part

and it's gonna untangle and we'll come out in this sort of long, straight

line, or maybe a wavy line with a love heart in there somewhere as well.

Um, and when we were in the squiggle, we were thinking of how do we try

some of these new ideas that Naomi is bringing to us on the floor

and reflect on them as a team.

And so we try new things.

We try embodiment.

We ask people, why don't you go and try dancing with a group on the floor today?

Or Why don't you try not drawing a work of art, but drawing the

ideas behind the work of art?

What does it mean to do play?

What does play look like on the floor?

So artist educators, were really going out on the floor

in this squiggly time and just.

Just testing things out and coming back and writing up on a shared whiteboard

their reflections that we could then take the reflections and have meetings

about and think about, you know, what the educators were discovering.

Um, and that process of campaigns has been really wonderful because

it's continued into just everyday practice now for educators.

So every fortnight we have a different campaign, uh, where we say today

we're thinking about how do we involve teachers when they come.

And today we're thinking about what are the words that we say when we introduce

a program and what does it look like if we reflect at the end of a program or,

at the end of every strategy so there's always, educators also have a campaign

suggestion box with a note on it that says, reflective practice is cool and

people come and put their, um, and put there, the suggestions for campaigns.

And so it started to become a really collaborative process that educators are

saying, well, this is what I want to try.

And every fortnight it changes, and they come and write their

reflections on the whiteboard.

So that's an example of what we did in the workshops and how it's

continued, obviously into everyday practice for the artist educators.

And it sounds like the artist educators have really gained

a lot from this process, so from the project itself, but that it is carried on

into their kind of practice since then.

Um, so how do you think this process has supported their confidence,

their professional identity?

I mean, you mentioned a few things about, you know, having that reflective practice.

What have you noticed that has changed?

There's importantly, there's a cohesive, defined approach to what we

do, which means that the artist educators have this, a sense of shared identity and

a community of practice with each other.

Whereas before, they may have been working more, there may have some informal

reflections and chats with each other and ideas shared, but there wasn't a formal

process to sharing ideas or for formal process, for even formulating ideas.

So what the research allowed us to achieve was, a set of program

frameworks, a strategy planning tool so that educators can, one educator

talked about how he collaborates with our creative learning approach.

Now, I think we'll talk about the tool a little bit later, but the

team really gained a methodology for working and for collaborating

and for this shared language.

And working towards a common goal, which is ultimately about building

empathy in students and facilitating joy for students and I think that

kind of what educators gained is this understanding of the bigger why and the

bigger purpose of what they're doing.

And I think, um, it's really helped them to align their

thoughts and their values together.

Yeah.

And it's so wonderful to hear.

Absolutely music to my ears.

If we go back to what you talked about, that kind of messy middle,

that squiggle that you were talking about, that messiness, and then

you were talking about the kind of strands that might emerge from that.

So talk to me a little bit about, a point during the process that

you felt like a shared approach was forming from the process.

So, yeah.

Can you talk to me a little bit about that?

I think we began with initial ideas about the

kind of pedagogical strategies that we wanted to play with.

Um, and that formed the basis of the workshops.

And then as we experienced the workshops together as a team and as Harriet led

the campaigns, I guess the ideas from those workshops started to come into

the language that the team were using.

So, I'm doing an embodied strategy today, or I'm thinking

about my inquiry questions.

And so that kind of shared understanding really started to

develop quite strongly there.

But at the same time.

We were thinking carefully about how the Art Through Culture principles

were informing our creative learning strategies and really

articulating how that was happening.

And so the idea of centering the artist's voice in a creative learning strategy

and connecting that to to existing knowledges that students bring with

them is a really key part of how we define our creative learning strategies

that is drawn, directly from the Art Through Culture principles that provide

us a sort of culturally aware and culturally responsive framework to, uh,

approaching our learning experiences.

But then other moments came in, in the writing of the report, it was

actually quite a, um, important moment where for the first time we

had to pinpoint, like, define ideas written down, it feels quite final.

And so there were moments there when we realized, oh, we weren't quite

on the same page about particular ideas or particular language.

And so a lot of conversation around, the right words that

really communicated what we meant.

Um, so that was a really interesting process of really

defining defining the approach.

And I think the other moment, really important moment for us was when Naomi

asked us to, uh, communicate elements of the approach in the form of diagrams.

And so Harriet mentioned our creative learning strategy, planning tool you

know, just the process of sitting together to work out well, what are

the elements that we need to articulate here and in what order and how do we

describe the importance of connecting the artist's voice with the student

knowledge to form a line of inquiry and have that as the starting point for how a

creative learning strategy is developed.

So those parts are really important, I think, in, in developing and

understanding our shared approach.

Yeah.

And there seem to be um, really clear values from what you're saying that

sit underneath all of this work.

So can you talk a little bit about the values, the vision, the commitments that

sit underneath developing this approach.

Sure.

Well, it's really interesting because we've jokingly said all along that we want

our programs to help shape good humans.

And then this project, and working with Naomi really asked us to

think about what we meant by that.

And was this even our responsibility as a national cultural institution?

So under Naomi's guidance, we went to our guiding documents.

So we went to the National Gallery Corporate Plan.

We went to the National Cultural Framework.

We went to the Embark Way Declaration for Education, which is the federal

government's direction for education and lifelong learning and the

Art Through Culture principles.

And we found in those documents the support for what we understood

making good humans to be.

And so that is how we were able to, um, speak about our work in terms of promoting

our responsibility to act with care and kindness for a sustainable and inclusive

future, and thinking about how our work deepens understanding of ourselves

and others and the importance of that.

And so it was also really important to the team.

Naomi mentioned earlier that there was space for joy and

creativity as part of our vision.

So it wasn't just about making good humans, it was also about being human.

And I think it was important to articulate this in the vision, and

Naomi was really the driver for us.

She said, you must have a vision.

And so it was really important to work that out because it, it justifies

the decisions we make about the content and direction of our program.

It guides our decision making and it helps us to understand what we do and also what

we don't do in terms of our programming.

I think that, the word joy was something really

important to us to keep in there.

And, and it was something that we thought really carefully about because maybe

some work in the gallery that we're looking at may not be about joy at all.

You know, that joy isn't always within an artist practice.

And that's one that I've really sat on because I think we, we were able

to think about joy as being more expansive than being in a happy

state, you know, than that letting out our visitors be just happy.

And that we saw that joy can come in quiet and profound ways, and through

empathy and through expressing yourself and through being listened

to and your opinions respected.

Um, and so those sorts of pedagogical approaches into, um, inquiry-based

learning and allowing students to bring their own knowledges really helped us

to think about what do we mean by joy?

And I personally, as for the values, I think joy is really valuable to me,

and I think the ways that we came to those values was really important

with, the diversity of, of our team.

All of our, uh, artist educators come from a diverse range of ages and cultural

backgrounds and ways of being and knowing in the world and art practices.

And it was really important to get all of us together in the room to really

talk about what is valuable to all of us individuals in the work that we do here.

And our team is not just education in schools, although that's kind of our

training ground, what we focused on at for the first stage of this project.

But our team includes people who are working in adult public programs and

access and disability inclusion programs and children and family programs.

So to hear their perspectives of what their priorities are and

how the values kind of fit in with them was really important.

But also all of our artists, educators with all of their diverse

ways of knowing the world and all of their diverse practices.

We have poets and we have visual artists and dancers and people who work in

human rights law and architects, and people who work in disability inclusion.

And so just having that vast wealth of knowledge that also

reflects the communities that we're working with and engaging with

every day was really important.

And I think the value statement and the vision statement that we got to there

was so much that was put into that through so many voices and people, and

I think we're all really proud of it.

And so I guess what they've produced is, you know, really

dynamic framework that encompasses a whole lot of ways of knowing and

being and looking and thinking.

And but they only have them for an hour.

As, you know, most museum educators will know.

And we, if you're having a good time, it's not about being frivolous.

You know, if you have fun, you, you can learn.

And if you have a good time at art museum, then you're more likely

to remember it and go back to it.

So that is really important for young people to see the National Gallery as

a place where joy can happen, you know, and they can make really good memories.

So, when the gallery has young people visiting, they often

come from all over Australia.

They have to come to Canberra, where the capitol to go to the

Parliament House, to the electoral Commission, to the War Memorial.

Um, they come to the National Gallery, they come to the Portrait Gallery, and

they're really exhausted because they're just going from one place to another.

And so it's really, you know, this is a chance for the

National Gallery to capture them.

And you're not gonna do that by them sitting in lines in front of a work

getting spoken to or at, you have to do it through listening to them and

working with them and yeah, seeing them and for them to be able to see

themselves in the gallery and in the work, and be able to relate to work.

It's all relational, everything that the gallery's been doing.

And that's sort of what it comes down to, I think.

Yeah, and I, urge anyone listening to look at the links we put

in the show notes, we'll link to the report, um, which has the vision statement

and all of the commitments in it.

So tell us about the strategies, the approach that you have.

How do they support educators when they're in the gallery with school groups?

We have developed a diagram which you'll share, that is our

creative learning strategy planning tool.

And that was the tool that I mentioned earlier, that one of our artist

educators, Andrew Cox, talked about that.

He loves it 'cause he can, he feels he can collaborate with this tool.

And it's like a visual guide or representation of how a creative

learning strategy can be built or how it is to think about it.

We also have in our team, strategy templates that educators can fill out

and they put in their line of inquiry and some suggested open-ended questions.

And the quote, the voice of the artist, always going back to the quote.

And what we really found was that the creative learning strategies

and this planning tool was we were able to visualize how the artist's

voice and the student knowledges can combine to make a line of inquiry.

So rather than starting with the work art and thinking of some sort of activity, we

were always imagining what we would assume the student might know about the world

and how that relates to what the artist is trying to tell us about their world.

And then the line of inquiry is combining those two things so that

there's this discussion that happens and through some sort of multimodal

active activity, which might be.

Drawing, it might be writing, it might be discussion, it might be doing any

manner of things, that conservation will let us do in the gallery.

We're able to, this is where the artist educators creative practice comes in.

That they develop these multimodal experiences that allow the students to

bring their knowledges, not just through talking or writing, but through so many

different ways that might be embodied.

Or it might be through music, or it might be through dance, or it might be through,

could indeed be through, through writing.

And so that students who can bring their knowledges and connect

with the world of the artists.

And there's this important reflection part of each strategy where students

can see the output, the experience that they've just had, and the learning

happens where they see how that's connected to each other and the work of

art and the world of the, of the artist.

So could you take us through because we can't actually

see that diagram, could you take us through the kind of the process that

an artist educator might go through to create that line of inquiry and

how it might work with the program?

Sure.

So we'll first start with a program framework.

So we have, four programs that students can book into.

Um, and each program has a framework, um, that tells us the ultimate learning goals.

Those frameworks have what we call a guiding inquiry that

we was talking about inquiry.

So each framework has an ultimate learning goal.

What are they gonna ultimately learn in a program at the National Gallery?

So they start with their guiding inquiry, their program goal, and then they select a

work of art that fits within that program.

And they research and see what the artist says about their work of art.

They, uh, find an artist quote.

And so say there is, I always give this example, and this is a fictional work

of art, but maybe I think I should make it one time, but it's about my examples

about the work of art, about the sky.

And the artist might say, I love the sky because it is really

meaningful for me and it helps me understand my place in the world.

So this is the artist quote.

And then the artist educator can reasonably assume that a student knows

all sorts of things about the sky.

And so they say, okay, well our line of inquiry now is what can

we gain through understanding our relationship to the sky, for example.

So we've got this.

Sky work.

We've got the artists talking about why the sky's important to them, and we want

to develop a multimodal creative learning strategy that's gonna help the students

express why the sky's important to them.

And so that might be through drawing or dancing or whatever it is.

And then there's this reflection moment at the end where the artist educator will ask

a question or posit something where the student can say, oh, well I now understand

how my students understand the sky, how my peers understand the sky, how my teacher

understands the sky, how I value the sky, and how this artist has taught me.

And this educator understands the sky and how this artist and educators help me to

understand how we all understand the sky in, in different and meaningful ways.

So that's where the learning occurs, and that's what the diagram

helps artist educators to achieve and to kind of stay on track in

how to develop those strategies.

Thank you for explaining that.

And before we get onto the kind of key teaching strategies, I just wanna circle

back to we've mentioned the idea of centering the artist's intention and

starting with that, leading with that in every discussion, every conversation

that you're having about an artwork.

So this might come as a slightly different approach to anyone listening who might

have, previously centered the participants might be person centered work, or it

might be perhaps object centered work.

So what does it mean to center the artist in a discussion?

And I'll add on another question.

What effect does that have on the participants?

How do you then make room for the participant voices

alongside that artist intention?

It's really, really important for us within our context to

center the voice of the artists because of our context within Australia and because

of our art through culture principles.

And so, Maggie Douglas and Noah Watson, who are our first Nations artist educators

and, and Crystal Hurst who'd done the work before them, recognize that within

First Nations learning pedagogies, we don't appropriate work, we don't draw work

that we see and we don't put voices on top of the artists- so our own perceived

understanding of the work and place that on top of the intention of the artist.

And so that really developed when we were looking at Art Through Culture

that really informed what we wanna do with the rest of our program.

And how can we learn through this First Nation's pedagogical practices

and implement it into the work that we are doing as well, so that we are

working in a way that is aligned with First Nations ways of being and doing.

And so, so for some institutions around the world, it would maybe

look different in person centered, student centered approaches might

be better for their context, but for our context, this is where we

arrived and it's really important, important part of the work that we do.

But what we want to do is really.

Center the voice of the artist doesn't mean that we're not centering

the voice of children as well.

And what we're trying to do in our practice as artist educators is put

the two voices in conversation that the artist says, I've done this

thing and this is what I think.

And then the students can respond to that and say, well, this is what I think,

and this is made me think about this.

Or, I've never heard of anything like that before, but I can

imagine it to be this way.

And so it's this conversational element rather than rather than

ignoring the intention of the artist

yeah, I think another really great thing that has been achieved through

leading through the voice of the artist.

And this is something that's really important to Leanne Waterhouse, our

education manager, and she's brought this to my attention the other day and

we talk about it a lot is how the leading with the artist voice also demystifies

the artists and humanizes them.

They're not this kind of exterior genius.

And we encourage Artist Educators to use the artist's first name.

You know, 'Penny made this picture of the sky'.

And it's this equalizing of the experience of artists who might seem as someone who's

has bigger ideas or more intellectual or, you know, bigger than, or better than, or

smarter than or something, than a student.

It is.

And by doing this way of of centering the artist's voice, and

focusing on conversation yeah.

It's more of a humanizing kind of process.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think the other thing it does is it democratizes it the museum a bit.

It gives power back to the artists and it's not about looking at the

artwork through curator's eyes or an artist historian's eyes.

It's going straight back to the artist.

So it's giving the voice back to the artist.

Yeah, absolutely.

And leading on from that, I'd love to talk about some of the

kind of teaching strategies you've mentioned, multimodality a few times.

I'd love to talk a little bit about that, how that works in the gallery

environment, perhaps what your artists, educators discovered when they did a

campaign about using movement within programs all those sorts of things.

Perhaps you can talk a little bit about the key strategies that you use.

We whittled it down to a few, and it's obviously inquiry led

and we've been talking about that.

And we are really talking about thinking with children, rather than for them.

And that's, you know, obviously relational and responsive.

We talk about noticing what children are interested in and, um, I was

listening to one of your earlier podcast, Claire, about inquiry and you

talked about that sort of uncertainty.

And a lot of people feel a bit scared to use inquiry because they

don't know where it's gonna go.

And I think that some of the strategies we've kind of come to really just work

really well with artists dispositions because that idea of risk taking and

uncertainty is part of how artists work.

So they're a little bit more comfortable with uncertainty

than maybe other people are.

So the inquiry is a big one.

And then thinking with and through materials is another.

So someone said to me that came to one of the workshops at the conference recently.

'Oh.

It's kind of coming at the work sideways', you know, and materials

, they can be tangible or intangible.

So they could be fabric or paper or pencils or objects, or they could,

it could be intangible, so it could be like sound and light and shadow.

So trying to think of different ways of entering work with materials is another.

And then we have embodied learning.

So this came about from wanting to, to get away from the stools and

sitting down and to be up and moving.

But it's not about big movements or it can be, but it can also be

about those little small movements.

So that kind of, when you're learning and using your body, it stays in you,

that becomes that tacit knowledge that you might pull out later on.

Um, you're more likely to remember something if you

do it alongside a movement.

Um, and this is interesting in the workshops because we had, uh, Anna

Johnson come in from the Canberra Youth Theater to do some work with us, and she

talked about gamifying the experience and showed the team a whole lot of

different strategies that, that she uses in the Canberra Youth Theater and how

they might be applied in the gallery.

And maybe Harriet can talk a bit more about that in a sec. 'Cause that

was a lot of fun and it kind of goes onto the next one, which is play.

So, you know, early years.

Educators know that play in the early years setting is work.

And then it becomes a little bit tricky as you go to primary school.

They see play as something that you do after school or in your lunch break.

But play is also another one of those things that artists do naturally.

They play and they make mistakes and they fail and they play and try again.

You know, and it's about that kind of, it's low stakes.

Failing, I guess.

And, um, and it's important, a very important part of the artist process.

So I guess when we are talking about looking at art, we're thinking about

creativity, we're thinking about creative processes, so there is those,

um, attributes like play, thinking with them through materials risk

taking, um, not knowing the outcome.

And that's kind of all mirrored through the strategies.

And then the final one is reflection.

And, um, that's that really important point where the students can

reflect on their own experiences and the work at the same time.

Yeah, I mean, I think I'll just say that multimodality

was really important to us because everyone learns in different ways.

Mm-hmm.

You know, it's an accessible approach where we can capture students

who might learn through material.

You know, that's their kind of preferred way of learning.

Or they might learn best through acting, which isn't everybody's cup of tea.

Or they might learn through maths and problem solving.

So if we speak to our artist educators about putting your mind into the mind

of the diversity of our students who come here and what are all the different

ways that people learn and be, and think and, um, be in the world, but also if

making a, a vocal response to something isn't within your comfort zone, but

you've been felt safe enough to give it a go anyway, what a wonderful way

to learn as well to push people safely out of their comfort zone a little bit.

So these multimodal ways allow students to, to engage in, in risk

taking and, and and also engage in ways that of learning that are really

uh, important and cherished by them.

I think one of the things that we have been thinking about now

that we've got learning strategies and the individual works that we

are looking at, under our belts.

We're now starting to think about the larger program and how we tr how we

move between works of art and how the entire experience is part of the program.

And it's not just these individual creative learning strategies where

you do a dance here and then you do writing here and then you do a poem

there and then the program's finished.

Because in an hour program we can only focus on three to four works of art.

We are focusing on them, but we're actually seeing many, many more.

So what are those moments of transition between strategies and between

works of art, where we are really experiencing what we're looking at?

Can we slow down?

Is there an embodied, a lot of educators gamify it where they do like ' point

at something that's interesting to you' or and this is our kind of next

wave of understanding, like how do we really think about the whole experience

as being part of the joy and the creativity and everything that our

vision, um, wants us to think about?

And I can imagine the artist, educators have a lot of fun, have a lot of

yes,

joy from designing these different teaching strategies that they

use and playing with them and adopting that kind of experimental mindset as well.

Yes, definitely.

And I think the tricky thing about artists, educators, which I think a

lot of your listeners will relate to, is that we don't get to develop these

year long relationships with students.

We see students most of the time for an hour, and then we never see them again.

And so our community is each other.

The community of an Artist Educator is the other Artist Educators.

And this is where reflective practice is really important.

We make art together, we do workshops together, because of our practices.

And I, I'm an artist myself, so, and so is everyone.

Leanne's an artist.

And Julia as an artist, we're all artists on this team.

And so when we are meeting and running these workshops, we are

always making together and we are thinking really creatively about

what does reflection look like?

So how do we navigate that is a question that we ask and do

together in community, I think.

And speaking of learning and growing and reflective practice,

I'd love to, to think about what you've learned from doing this work.

Were there any surprises that came along the way?

What did you learn about working collaboratively in this way together?

Well I really learned the value of my colleagues.

And that sounds silly because obviously I valued them already

before we started this project.

But what I learned along the way, um, was the importance of working with colleagues

who are equally committed to thinking deeply about what we do and why we do

it, and the importance of relationships in being able to do this kind of

work and this kind of collaboration.

So this approach is the result of hours of conversation where we

might debate at length the meaning of individual words to find the

right way to communicate our ideas.

And so allowing the necessary time to have those conversations was really important.

But also having the strong and trusting relationships where we're comfortable

to disagree with each other, and to look at things from different perspectives.

We couldn't have done that work if relationships weren't at the center.

And that brings us back to the commitments that define how we work is

centering relationships is at the start.

And that's as equally important as with each other as it is with centering

the relationships with our learners.

Yeah, I think relationships are key and if you

don't spend the time to develop the relationships, your collaboration

isn't gonna be as successful.

So I think, um, you have to make space and time and, um, sometimes

that might mean having a meeting that you feel like maybe you didn't

get something out of it, but you did because you spent time with that person.

And that's really important.

I, I think I would take forward the participatory action research

approach and the co-design.

I think listening to the voices from the ground up was really

important in this project to hear everyone's voices and kind of, um,

bring everybody along for the ride.

And though it can be really tricky when you're working with so many

different people I think, you learn so much from each other, so I feel

like it has, shaped and changed my teaching practice, for example.

So, I think at times we were sharing ideas and I'd take the, something I

picked up from the gallery and take it into my classroom at the university.

So, um, yeah, I love collaboration and it was really great working with these guys

and I learned so much and yeah, so going forward I would just, I would take them

brilliant.

And Harriet.

I think what's been really revelatory for me, and I was

talking to Leanne, our education manager about this the other day

is to practice what we preach.

You know, when we have presented this project, when we have workshops

with our Artist Educators, we run them in the same way that we would

run a creative learning strategy.

And by that I mean, we think about the audiences and their multimodal

ways of doing and being we, uh, often do creative activities.

We think about what is the inquiry that we are doing here.

And so I think that's been really, um, amazing for me in my practice

or my role as someone who is supporting Artist Educators.

And through supporting Artist Educators, I can lead through this lens of inquiry

itself and thinking of multimodal ways that artists, educators might receive

information that just isn't just me and Leanne standing and telling them

what to do, but in the same manner that we do creative learning strategies,

we draw together and we've made this quilt and we make sculptures out

of wire and we, really think deeply about the practice of being an Artist

Educators through these creative ways.

And I think I'm just at the beginning of my journey of understanding

how to work in that way.

In the role that I'm in now as opposed to with students all the time.

Although I still do get to see students, which I'm thrilled about.

I make that a priority at least a couple of times a month.

I love that it is, uh, has all these little ripples

outwards as well, this project.

Um, it's really lovely to see if anyone is listening and thinking

that they might be keen to start this sort of a project within their own

organization, within their own team.

Where might people start?

Do they, do you have a couple of small tips for people listening?

Yeah, we talked about this one before.

Where do you start?

And I guess it's knowing who you are and trying to figure out, what's your

context, which is where we started with, um, with this project, you know, yeah,

what's your remit and who's your audience?

And you don't have to collaborate with the university obviously, but it's a

really great opportunity and if you wanted to reach out to your local university,

they would probably be thrilled to do something like this with you.

So I think that's something people could think about.

That's great.

And we're gonna have to wrap up now, but I'd love to hear what's next

for you and then maybe you can tell listeners a little bit more about

where they can find out more about you and the Creative learning project.

And of course we'll put all the notes in all the links in the show notes.

So what's next?

Well, I'm really excited to start working with our

broader learning team to understand how the approach and the creative

learning strategy planning tool might apply beyond our school's programs.

So I'm already working closely with our kids and families convener to

think about how the planning tool might support the development of

in gallery resources for families.

And we're also thinking about how it might support a framework for engagement spaces

where we commission artists to create making spaces associated with exhibitions.

So there's lots of really exciting opportunity, now that these

tools are providing for us and supporting us to think deeply

our approaches in other areas.

So I'm really excited to, to keep carrying on that work and seeing

what we can learn from that.

And we, we also talked about, evaluating the

impact of the creative learning approach and seeing Yeah.

Seeing how it's going, which would be great.

And what's next for me is continuing working with the artist

educators to embed this approach.

And also I'm very excited about working on our early years program framework.

Because through this project, we've developed all of our program frameworks

for our upper primary and high school students who are our largest cohort.

Um, but now I'll be spending the year thinking about different learning and

teaching approaches for our early years.

So preschool, you know, three year olds up to eight year olds in.

And yeah, I've got lots of things in the pipeline figuring out that,

which I'm very thrilled about.

Fantastic.

And who's gonna talk about where listeners can find out

more about you and the project.

You can find out more about us and the project on our website

or just search our creative learning approach, when you go to the nga.gov

au you'll reach a page that's very succinct, that tells you all about it

in just a few words, but you can also download the research report as a PDF.

And we'll get an easy reading one up there too soon.

Yeah.

And, uh, it's well worth the read.

I'd recommend it to anyone listening.

It's a really interesting read and a beautiful design as well.

That just leaves me a couple of moments just to say thank you so much for

coming on the Art Engager Podcast today.

It's been a joy talking about this project with you.

So thank you for participating.

Thank, thank us.

So a huge thank you to Georgia, Harriet, and Naomi for such a

thoughtful and generous conversation.

You can find links in the show notes to the National Gallery of Australia's

creative Learning Approach webpage, the full Creative Learning Project

publication, which is a great read and the related academic article in

the Australian Journal of Education.

If you've enjoyed this episode or if previous episodes of The Art Engager

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or sharing the episode with a colleague.

And if you're interested in thinking more deeply about designing guided

experiences, you can buy my book, The Art Engager, reimagining Guided Experiences

in Museums, wherever you buy your books.

So thank you so much for listening, and I'll see you next time.

Thank you for listening to The Art Engager podcast with me, Claire Bown.

You can find more art engagement resources by visiting my website,

thinking museum.com, and you can also find me on Instagram at Thinking

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Thank you so much for listening, and I'll see you next time.