Teacher Maker Camp

Technology is playing an increasingly important role in young people's lives and in education, making technology education more relevant than ever. Digital literacy is not just about knowing how to use technology. It is also about understanding how it works, questioning it and recognising how you can shape it yourself. Through the Teacher Maker Camp, Waag Futurelab supports teachers in bringing digital literacy and maker education into their teaching.

Maker education

Maker education is a hands-on way to explore digital literacy. Making, designing and experimenting can reveal how technology works and where there is room to make different choices. At the Teacher Maker Camp, teachers experience this approach for themselves. They explore different technologies and ways of working, while considering how to use them in their own teaching.

Teachers work together to develop activities, ideas and materials they can use directly in the classroom. Rather than focusing on technical expertise, the Teacher Maker Camp encourages curiosity about technology and an interest in broadening technology education for students. Waag supports teachers in bringing maker education and digital literacy into their lessons and using them to enrich the existing curriculum.

The Teacher Maker Camp is connected to Waag's research programme Skills for the Future, which explores the skills people need to engage critically with technology and play an active role in shaping the world around them.

Teacher Maker Camp at Waag

Waag has been running Teacher Maker Camps for many years, drawing on its experience in maker education. Earlier editions at the Creative Learning Lab introduced teachers to technologies such as digital fabrication, 3D printing, electronics and programming. As technology, research and education continue to evolve, so do the Teacher Maker Camps.

The current Teacher Maker Camp is part of Techkwadraat, a multi-year programme for technology education in primary and secondary schools.