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Lookup NU author(s): Catherine Keay, Dr Pamela Woolner
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
© 2025 The Author(s). International Journal of Art & Design Education published by National Society for Education in Art and Design and John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This paper explores the implementation and evaluation of Imagination Agents, a mixed-methods case study, with young people aged 12–13, funded by a Royal Society of Arts Catalyst Award. The project was grounded in a flexible theory that imagination enables the necessary originality for creativity, enabling learners to construct personal understandings of their own learning which equate to metacognition, with this enabling the self-awareness and confidence for personal and, in turn, social/democratic agency. Life in a posthuman world necessitates the creation of new understandings, which can be produced through the application of imagination and agency, towards the conceptualisation and facilitation of positive change. Supporting learners to develop imagination and understand it metacognitively could result in personal agency which better equips them as participants within and activators of healthy environments. Based on Burns' (2024) models of cognitive/metacognitive imagination, we tried to support imagination and agency through a focus on the local environment. Implementation of the pedagogy and evaluation was very challenging in the school context. There was little space for imagination and agency. In conclusion, we consider how we might create such a space.
Author(s): Burns H, Dick S, Keay C, Robb A, Woolner P
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: International Journal of Art and Design Education
Year: 2025
Pages: Epub ahead of print
Online publication date: 26/03/2025
Acceptance date: 02/04/2018
Date deposited: 14/04/2025
ISSN (print): 1476-8062
ISSN (electronic): 1476-8070
Publisher: John Wiley and Sons Inc.
URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jade.12572
DOI: 10.1111/jade.12572
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