What is Little Architect?
Little Architect is an education programme for teaching architecture and the urban environment in primary schools, both in and outside London, led by the Architectural Association School of Architecture, UK registered charity. We teach school children from Reception to Year 6 (aged 4 to 11) how to observe, understand and enjoy architecture, and to become active citizens in what we hope will be a more sustainable future. Our in-school workshops are delivered in partnership with the class teacher and embedded into the UK national curriculum. We help children achieve their learning targets through architecture and art, while the programme provides the opportunity for pupils to think and communicate about buildings and cities through drawing. We encourage children to create new, futuristic urban environments and to pay attention to the amazing world around them. We want to trigger a new relationship with contemporary architecture and their local surroundings in which they are caring for, but also being critical of the cities we all inhabit.
How does Little Architect work?
We design tailor made lessons to cover, through architecture, any of the statutory and non- statutory KS1 and KS2 themes present in the academic year. We create strong links with history, geography, science, design and technology, art and social and health education. We visit the class from just once up to three times depending on the teacher´s choice.
Do we have an specific methodology?
We have developed a time line based methodology where we teach about the past, the present and the future of the city incorporating cartoons, movies and books related to the children´s culture realm. We teach to think, to observe, to be reflexive and critical before making. Our lessons are 60% Theory and 40% Practical.
October 2014. Hungerford School (Islington) “The Caledonian Clock Tower” Year 4 (1 session) - Links: Geography, History and Art. The workshop was organised in collaboration with Islington Heritage and Greenspace as part of the Caledonian Park Clock Tower renovation project funded through the Heritage Lottery Fund. The main objective of the workshop was to develop the children understanding of the clock tower evolution and contemporary architecture. Little Architect designed a 3D leaflet, which was divided into three parts featuring the tower in the past and the present and inviting the children to draw and describe its present and its future. January & February 2015. St. Luke’s Primary School ( Islington) “Florence Nightingale” Year 1 (3 Sessions)- Links: Geography, History, and Science. This workshop explored architecture through Florence Nightingale’s life. We built a miniature Victorian Theatre to use for a final puppet show using their own drawings of buildings and characters for the show. The workshop involved the same group of students over three sessions. Firstly we focused on London during Florence Nightingale life (the past), secondly on the present of our city and the third day on the future. This provided an opportunity to discuss the evolution of the city imagining that she was accompanying us in a form of time travel. March 2015. St. Peter and St. Paul Roman Catholic ( Islington) “Planets and Space” Year 5 (1 Session) - Links: Science,Citizenship, Sustainability Year 5 was studying the Solar System. The objective of the workshop was to expand creativity by showing unusual architecture and designing futuristic buildings and to empower children to improve their actual city. Little Architect researched the climate and ground conditions of Mars, and prepared a large cardboard cut out of the planet itself. This was used as the base on which the drawings were collaged. We also prepared a leaflet to foster creative writing about society in the future.
July 2015. Earlswood School ( Surrey) “Future Cities” Years 2 (1 session)- Links: Science,Citizenship, Art Little Architect travelled to Red Hill, a small town in Surrey, to teach about Future Cities. We showed images of fantastical architecture, both built and un-built as a way to inspire children to think creatively about the future of our cities. Each child was asked to imagine their ideal future building, they cut their drawings out to make a big mural using the work of the four Year 2 classes together in the following school year. October 2015. Netley Primary School (Camden) United Nations Sustainable Development Goal, Number 4: ‘Quality Education’ Year 2 (3 Sessions)- Links: History, Geography, Art, Citizenship, We proposed a collaborative workshop in which two school models would be compared. The project was aimed to bridge kids who were involved in the design of their own learning centre in Tacloban, the Philippines and children living and studying in Camden, London. We created a series of presentations and videos, which children could watch to learn about their counterpart students in either the UK or the Philippines. We fostered observation of their school environment and encouraged curiosity and interest in other ways of living and studying, enjoying the parallelism in games, homework and school routines.
Dec 2015 to July 2016. Betty Layward Pr. School ( Hackney) “The Active Planet, Roof Tops, The Solar System, My Local area, The Big Fire of London...” Year 1-Year 5 ( 21 Sessions) Links: History, Geography, Art, Citizenship, Betty Layward opted to have every year, from Year 1 to Year 5 inclusive, participate in Little Architect workshops. We made skyline crowns, pop-up cards, collages and the whole solar system in the future. The main objective for this series of workshops was to create variety which would work both individually and together when sharing all what we did in a big final assembly and exhibition with all the school children and parents. Our overall aim was to convey to children that working and thinking creatively can be helpful in life beyond architecture. March 2016. Queens College Prep School ( Westminster) “Little Red Riding Hood in your Local Area” Year 1 & 2 (2 Sessions) Links: Literacy, Geography, Art, History The main aim of the workshop was to foster observation and to empower the children to have aspiration to improve and engage with their built environment. The workshop presentation, discussion and output was firmly embedded in their literacy topic. Little Red Hiding Hood was used as a device to study the past, present and future of London. Colouring and abstraction was used for the study and exploration of the past, while drawing and collaging was used for the study of the present and the future. The history and architecture of the school building itself, designed by Robert Adams in the 18th Century was used to give a direct example of the potential of architecture to evolve over time.
March 2016. Catford Rathfern School ( Lewisham) “Future Cities” Year 5 (3 Sessions) - Links: Science, Technology Sustainability, Art The main objective of the workshop was teach children about the demands and challenges facing future cities. A large part of the presentation and discussion focused on the how we can make cities sustainable in the future. The main of the workshop was to inspire the pupils, and encourage them to believe that anything is possible, regardless the available technology. Each student was asked to draw a building for the future London. We also asked the children to present their work to their piers and to explain their designs for the future. 25th April 2016. British Library (Camden) Primary Careers Conference 2016 Year 5 (2 Sessions) - Links: Science, Technology Sustainability, Art Camden Council invited Little Architect for a second time, to participate in the ‘Primary School Careers Conference’ to present and discuss the architectural profession. The aim of the general event was to encourage and inspire children to begin consider possible career choices from an early age. Little Architect focused the workshop on what it means to study and work as an architect beyond designing buildings. The presentation was made from a very broad perspective including art, urban projects, engineering, video games, furniture design etc.
“Thank you for an inspiring workshop that challenged children’s conceptions of conventional building designs and dared children to imagine beyond boundaries of what their futures could look like. The children were empowered to feel that their sustainable designs and ideas mattered” - Lily Pang. Year 4 Teacher. Rathfern School. Lewisham.
“The children were very motivated to draw their future local area buildings, and one boy who is usually off task got really stuck in, even bringing in another building he had drawn at home to show me! The children enjoyed looking at the photographs of buildings, as did I. It definitely enhanced our understanding” - Sophie Klimt. Year 2 Teacher. Christopher Hatton School. Camden.
“It was a great project which had strong curricular links to Geography topics and the children developed a good understanding of how to produce a more eco friendly London. They were incredibly proud of their crowns and shared them with another class also.” - Katie Stewart, Year 1 teacher. St Joseph R.C. Westminster
“The project worked perfectly with the school’s Global Goals project. Your communication with us was really great, you tried your up most to adapt the project to what the school wanted and supported us above and beyond with our exhibition. Overall, we were more than happy with the outcome of the project and thank Little Architect for all the hard work they put in” - Nina Butcher, Year 2 teacher. Netley School. Camden.
We are offering our courses to every primary school in and out of London. More than 2300 school children from over 26 different schools have taken part in our lessons. We teach in state and independent schools during the statutory learning hours because in this way with our lessons we reach as many children as possible from all kind of backgrounds. We are not offering after school clubs. We have a standard fee, starting with £150 pounds up to £350 per session run by one or two of our AA tutors. Our lessons are normally 2 hours long. Our audience varies from 15 to 180 kids at a time. Please don´t hesitate to contact us regarding any special proposal. We will prepare a bespoke quote depending on your school´s needs and number of workshops you want us to run. Little Arhcitect Director: Dolores Victoria Ruiz Garrido Littlearchitect@aaschool.ac.uk visitingschool@aaschool.ac.uk T + 44 (0)20 7887 4014 F + 44 (0)207 414 0782 http://littlearchitect.aaschool.ac.uk FbK: AA Little Archi Twitter: @LittlearchiAA
With our primary school lessons we are seeking for more committed, curious and conscious citizens in the future. Little Architect is the AA’s contribution to a more creative and critical future society.Â