The Options…

So Now What?
Exploring the basics of what you can do in a 4D Immersive Space and how it fits into your settings style. Experience a taster of creative immersive learning approaches and an introduction to our software, 4D create.

Content, Creation and Creativity.
A greater examination of the opportunities our software 4D create can offer you. How to source elements and use them to enhance the space, quickly and effectively. Finding out what works, what has impact and how to involve young people in the in the process. How to create interactive content can also be part of any workshop where this is an aspect of your 4D Immersive Space.

Creative Thinking and Learning.
How to engage with all learning styles and recognising the characteristics of the creative learner, focusing on originality, imagination, having a purpose and adding value.

Creative Workshops & Masterclasses.
From storytelling to den making, drama workshops to bespoke creative sessions, we are developing a range of exciting sessions to inspire learners and colleagues.

Have a different course in mind? 
Just get in touch, we can design training sessions to meet your needs and intended outcomes.

Pricing
The costs of our sessions cover a fully trained, experienced practitioner and all materials for the day including hand outs of the session. (plus VAT & expenses)

The next steps…
To book a course, call the 4D creative team on 0844 414 2595, email us via the contact page or register your details below

4D create is the result of many hours of development, programming and testing but we are delighted with the finished software. We now have a piece of bespoke software that is easy to use and super simple to programme meaning pupils and teachers can upload their own content and create their own immersive experience in minutes.

We took lots of great videos and photos of the day and these will be live soon!

In the mean time, you can watch a stop motion video of the event over on our YouTube channel. 

Set up by Ian Fordham and Ty Goddard, the Education Foundation is a new cross-sector think tank and it’s aims are to help shape education policy and work towards creating exceptional schools across the UK.

We’ve partnered with the Education Foundation as we share their believe that through innovation and technology we can create fantastic environments for teaching and learning.

Based in the heart of London, The Learning Lab “is a centre for innovation and a space where education leaders – from early years, teachers, school and college leaders, skills and work based learning providers, higher education professionals and businesses – can work, be inspired and help shape the future of education”

From our visits to the lab, we know this will be a really exciting space where new ideas will be tested by those with the knowledge and influence to develop innovative methods of teaching and learning.

For the launch, Cathy went back to her theatre roots and built a mini 4D space. This meant we could easily show the guests exactly what we do and the educational benefits of our spaces. It also gave us a chance to showcase our brand new software which makes it quick and easy for teachers and pupils to programme their own immersive experiences.

4D micro being built!

The launch was a great success and included speeches from Graham Stuart MP (Chair of the Education Select Commitee), Kate Russell (presenter at BBC Click) and Indy Johar (Co-founder of Hub Westminster)

“The Learning Lab is an exciting project that gives companies and partners a great chance to showcase their products, services and innovative work, as well as connect up with leading educators from across the UK”

Graham Stuart MP, Chair, Education Select Committee

Ben explains 4D Immersive Spaces to Graham Stuart MP (Chair of the Education Select Committee)

As a company with an innovative approach to education, we see great value in our partnership with the Education Foundation and firmly believe it will help push our concept of immersive learning further into the mainstream.

You can read and comment on Cathy’s blog over at the Huffington Post website or read on below the photo.

If you want to let us know what you think or to get in touch for a tour of a 4D Immersive Space, just let us know via our contact page. 

I love making dens. Give me some string, a sheet and a few bamboo sticks and I can knock up another world in minutes. Somewhere to play, have fun and make up your own rules. But den making isn’t something I do just for my own children. Every week I go into schools and help pupils and teachers transform classrooms into war-torn towns, cavernous Egyptian pyramids and enchanted forests.

We’ll need many more enchanted classrooms if the government gets its way with ‘identikit’ schools. Following a major review of education capital by Dixons retail boss Sebastian James last year, Michael Gove announced a standardised design policy. All new schools will be built to a uniform set of drawings, prompting criticism of a dull, ‘flat pack’ approach that may leave schools devoid of any character.

A few weeks ago Building magazine reported that schools delivery body the Education Funding Agency had toned down this policy, replacing standardised school plans with more ‘base-line’ design guidance. Whatever is decided on school design, a significantly reduced funding pot means that future classrooms will be far less bespoke and much more like the thousands of other education buildings across the country.

This is all very well in financial terms. But as schools finally get the refurbishment projects they have been crying out for since the days of Building Schools for the Future (BSF), will they have to sacrifice ‘sparkling’ classrooms for tidy ones?

By sparkling I mean a learning space that excites and inspires children. Somewhere they can’t wait to go into. Maybe it’s a room with surround sound. When the teacher is talking about the industrial revolution he touches a button. The lights dim and the sound of a hundred noisy weaving machines fills the air.

There is the whir and hum of repetitive work and then someone is shouting – a worker is injured. The lights come up and the sound stops. A heavy spindle of cotton thread is passed around the group. Each child holds the spindle and describes how it must have felt to work such long hours at their age in a busy and often dangerous mill.

This classroom and its interesting mix of low and high tech resources had helped Year 4 see, hear and touch the industrial revolution from a completely different angle. They couldn’t believe the conditions children were working in. Their understanding was enhanced and they wanted to know more – a response the teacher might not have got had he not morphed their classroom into a 19th century cotton mill.

Months ago I worked with 10 and 11-year-olds to build a rainforest den in their school hall. The teacher was able to project a landscape of trees and vines on to the walls. Each child painted an animal or bird to live in the forest and then recorded the noise their creature makes. The teacher piped these sounds into the hall. Green lighting showed we were in the depths of the jungle.

The next day the students went back to their room and everything had disappeared. Images of trees graced the walls but the creatures they had spent so long creating had gone and so had the animal noises. They got angry. They asked questions. Why have their animals vanished? What is going on? Where have they gone?

The discussion turned to deforestation and suddenly the walls were filled with images of destroyed forests, logs being towed away and manmade fires. The sound of chain saws got louder and red lighting created an intense atmosphere.

The children were furious. The den they had painstakingly created had produced an emotional connection between them and the subject. It has sparked their imagination and they wanted to find out more.

This is the power of turning classrooms into dens. Both examples show how education spaces can transport children to different locations and times. In seconds they can become unique environments, making learning fun and dynamic.

But this isn’t just about the students. Teachers need to feel inspired and motivated too. They should have the tools to experiment with fresh ideas and this will raise teaching standards and help schools to stand out, be that to parents, inspectors or prospective students.

As a teacher said to me recently, “you think about teaching from new angles if you’re planning next week’s lessons sat on a bean bag with waves lapping at your feet.”

The pupils at St Christopher’s had spent the last few weeks on a journey to learn all about the Titanic. This included building a model of the ship in the school hall and some pupils were also lucky enough to have a day out to see the incredible Giants walk the streets of Liverpool. (An event we at Team 4D also enjoyed!)

We sent our INSET practitioner extraordinaire Gav to run a story telling session in the 4D Immersive Space. We developed a series of incredible new images, sounds and lighting states to help transport the pupils to the deck of the ship in1912. The soundscapes were particularly impressive and were designed by our most recent intern Lauren.

Gav told the story of the Titanic from the perspective of Lawrence Beesley, a survivor of the disaster . By changing the atmosphere in the 4D Immersive Space with light sound and projection, he was able to get the pupils into the mindset of the passengers and encouraged them to think about the feelings and emotions of those on board. Something that had previously felt like a historical project, now felt very real to the young people learning.

Here’s some pictures from the event and also a letter we received this week from a pupil at St Christopher’s.

As a new member of our team, Gav has joined us to improve our training and INSET options. A former drama teacher and creative practitioner, Gav is able to show how you can really use our immersive spaces to inspire pupils. He can also explain how to use our 4D create software to create incredible immersive learning environments in non techie language! If you’d like to find out what other INSET and creative workshops we have available, just get in touch!

This is the same great concept but we are now able to install spaces a lot faster reducing the cost of each installation.

The first school to take advantage of this new system is Crescent Primary in Stoke. We’ll be uploading a whole bunch of photos soon but in the mean time here’s a couple of quick snaps of the finished space.

If you’d like any further information, then feel free to get in touch!

We are looking for an office and finance administrator to join our busy creative team. You’ll be key to ensuring that processes and systems in our busy office run smoothly and efficiently. You’ll need to be friendly, organised, self-motivated and efficient with exceptional numeracy skills and a proven track record in a similar role. If you are enthusiastic, focused and resourceful with an excellent eye for detail then we want to hear from you!

You can find details on how to apply and the full job pack right here.

Closing date : Wednesday 2nd May

Free Creative INSET

Thursday 26th April – Parklands High School, Liverpool

The workshop will explore the impact of immersive learning environments and how using found materials, projection, lighting and sound can allow creativity to flourish across the curriculum from EYFS right through to Key Stage 2.  The session is packed full of practical, affordable and achievable ideas to take back to your own school!

Session 1 – 2.45pm – 4pm

Session 2 – 3.45pm – 5pm

NB Both sessions will be identical and include a brief tour of the 4D Immersive Space.

4D Open Day

Tuesday 24th April

Croxteth Primary School, Liverpool

2pm – 6pm (Open drop in)

This event is your chance to check out this incredible immersive space we have recently installed at the school and meet the team behind the design. You can experience how one press of a button can completely transform a space and how our team have created an incredible new learning environment.

Numbers are limited for both events so head over to our ‘Open Days’ Registration Page’ to book your place!

Alternatively, if you are unable to attend this date but want more information you can send us a quick message and we will be in touch. Contact us over here!

You can read the piece at the Guardian’s site via this link or the full transcript is below.

We’d love to hear what you think so you can either comment on the article, email us via our contact page or drop us a quick message on our Twitter feed (@4dcreative)

Why we need to bring creativity and technology back together across the curriculum

A professional den-maker on how she helps teachers transform their classrooms into thrilling learning environments

Last year Eric Schmidt, chairman of Google challenged the British education system. He said he was flabbergasted to learn that computer science isn’t taught as standard in UK schools. “Your IT curriculum focuses on teaching how to use software, but gives no insight into how it’s made. That is just throwing away your great computer heritage.”

Schmidt’s point goes deeper than a critique of today’s ICT teaching. He was highlighting the divisions between those who teach and learn humanities in Britain and everyone else in the science and engineering “camp”. Schmidt encouraged UK educationalists to reunite art and science, something that Apple’s founder Steve Jobs had advocated the benefits of many years earlier. In an interview with the New York Times in 1997, readers were reminded that Jobs had once said the Macintosh turned out so well because the people working on it were musicians, artists, poets and historians who also happened to be excellent computer scientists.

This enforced separation between technical and creative teaching and learning is something I see a lot in schools. I make my living as a den-maker – helping teachers morph dull classrooms into thrilling learning environments. Technology is essential to what I do, as important as the fabric, boxes, plastic hoops and giant envelopes I use.

I might project images of children working in a 19th century mill on the walls for a lesson on the industrial revolution. Sounds of the hum and crash of machines and the drip of water trickling down the walls is piped into the room. Lights are darkened and students are asked what it feels like to be twelve and working fourteen hours a day in a damp factory.

Children touch cold metal parts from an old weaving machine and feel the clumps of cotton threads which they might have had to clear from under machines if they had lived in Manchester 200 years ago. They see a bloodied bandage on the floor and talk about the dangers of working in a mill.

Suddenly the atmosphere changes and pupils stop what they are doing. We are in a state of the art computer factory, down the road in Manchester. Pictures of hi-tech machines fill the walls and the zoom and whiz of technology is heard all around us. Flashes of light convey a busy working environment. The children build a modern day work station complete with computer, desk, phone and iPad. Using large cardboard speech bubbles they talk about the differences between this twentieth century factory and the old mill. How have working conditions changed? How have the industries in their city developed in the last 200 years?

It’s this combination of low and high-tech resources that enables immersive learning to take place. Children see, hear, touch and imagine new ways of finding out about the industrial revolution. They ask questions, want to know more, they are keen to try things for themselves and own their learning. This is something you might not get from using text books or a video.

The key is integrating technology and creativity. I will never give up the bobbly white blanket, the large cardboard tubes, the crackly blue plastic sheet and bucket of polished stones that I use in many schools. But when these found materials are combined with sound, projected image and light to create an imagined environment, children are totally engrossed in the experience. They begin to empathise with twelve year old children in the Victorian era who had to work long hours and risk their fingers on sharp machines in the damp textiles mill. Their understanding is enhanced and they begin making links.

Yet in so many schools today science and the arts are kept separate. Children sit on their own in front of computer screens completing maths games rather than using video cameras in the school grounds to make films about number patterns in nature. Lights are saved for the school play, audio equipment for modern foreign language lessons.

Instead we need to use ICT to create socially rich experiences, right across the curriculum. It’s great that Michael Gove is encouraging teachers to use gadgets in computer science to develop the vision, imagination and creativity of children but what about drama or geography, history or creative writing lessons? We need to get better at using electronic resources creatively to make learning and teaching more effective.

• Cathy Cross is creative director of 4D creative. Find her on Twitter@cathy_cross.

Matthew Moss High School in Rochdale commissioned us to transform their main hall and our design team have pulled out all the stops to produce an incredible space!

Head over to our portfolio page now for all the info on the design plus some stunning photos.