The Learnlab model is a learning framework that guides students through five phases: activate, explore, deepen, concretize and reflect. It promotes deep understanding by combining knowledge, skills and character development. Supported by digital tools and a learning-centered AI, the model encourages active participation, creativity and collaboration.
Purpose:
Create motivation and a desire to learn for the upcoming work.
Question:
“What comes to mind when you hear [topic]?”
Activities:
Desired Reaction:
“This was exciting. I want to learn more!”
Purpose:
Develop engagement skills so that students can make informed choices.
Question:
“Which parts of the topic do you think are most interesting? Let’s explore it together.”
Activities:
Desired Reaction:
“Now I have an overview of the topic and know what I want to work on next!”
Purpose:
Learn more about specific parts of the topic, preparing for the concretization phase.
Question:
“How are we going to learn more about this?”
Activities:
Desired Reaction:
“Now I know enough to create something concrete where I can demonstrate my skills!”
Purpose:
Give students opportunities to demonstrate competence based on their own conditions.
Question:
“What can you create or do to show what you have learned?”
Activities:
Desired Reaction:
“Now I am proud of what I’ve worked on and ready to showcase it!”
Purpose:
Learn from the process through reflection.
Question:
“What have you done, what were you thinking along the way, and what have you learned from the process?”
Activities:
Desired Reaction:
“I’ve learned a lot and know what I can do better next time.”
Unit Planning is designed to be flexible, based on needs. A unit can last from a few days to several months. This flexibility is due to the ability to collaborate across subjects by inviting other teachers to participate in the unit, as well as two main levels of planning:
Tips for planning:
Adapted Didactic Relation Model:
For concrete planning, you can use a didactic relation model that considers value-based and principled factors, as well as specific elements in the planning phase.
Rich Tasks:
Rich tasks refer to learning activities that provide students with the opportunity to explore complex concepts and apply knowledge and skills across different disciplines. These tasks are designed to be open-ended and ambiguous, encouraging critical thinking and problem-solving. Here are some key characteristics of rich tasks:
At Learnlab, we believe in the value of rich tasks as an inclusive method so that all students can easily get started and understand the tasks. We offer various tools that enable creative learning, either individually or in collaboration with others. These tools are also tailored to meet specific needs, such as language adaptations.
How can AI contribute?
It is wise to start the learning process by sparking curiosity and motivation in the student. This initial phase is crucial for harnessing the students’ inherent curiosity and making use of their existing knowledge base. The primary goal here is to create a sense of relevance and eagerness to learn, which will drive the work that follows.
Our presentation tool is perfect for sparking curiosity and activating prior knowledge by facilitating participant input through open tasks, word clouds, polling, and step-by-step progression.
Our mind map tool can be used by creating a shared mind map where we gather input on the relevant topic, concept, or term. At the end of the period, the mind map can be updated with a different color code to show what new information has been learned.
Our book tool can, for example, be used for the writing relay. Have the students write what they remember about the topic for 1-2 minutes, then they switch learning units and continue their learning partner’s text.
Ask the students to create a short video or audio file where they share everything they remember about the topic. They can take on roles such as news reporters or journalists interviewing each other.
For reflection:
How can AI contribute?
Our AI can summarize student input in Presentation, highlight the range of students’ thinking, and develop reflective questions based on the learning objectives and key concepts that the teacher has pre-added.
The phase is about giving students an overview of what the topic is about so they can make informed choices about what they want to delve deeper into. This is a phase that is often overlooked. We often desire various forms of student involvement in school, and this requires us to develop students’ engagement skills and further develop their identity, interests, and motivation. This is achieved by providing opportunities to navigate through and interact with the topic in a way that resonates with their individual learning styles and preferences.
Our presentation tool can be used as a resource bank by adding links, videos, and content that students can explore directly within the app. Students can contribute suggestions for good sources in open tasks. This is a great opportunity to practice source criticism.
Our mind map tool can be used as a resource bank with links, videos, uploaded documents, and audio files. Students can also co-write in the mind map and share interesting information they find, categorizing it together.
Our book tool can be used as a resource bank with various links, videos, audio files, and content. The teacher can copy content from the library for students to explore or create content themselves. Students can use the engaging reader to have text read aloud or translated into multiple languages.
The teacher can create podcasts or videos, or share these from the library for students to explore.
For reflection:
How can AI contribute?
Our AI can summarize mind maps or multimodal books that the teacher wants students to explore in mind maps and Books. For some, this can be a way to adjust the difficulty level, as the summary can be read aloud and translated into different languages.
Deepening enables a thorough understanding of key knowledge, skills, and aspects of personal development that are considered important during the period. In this phase, students are guided to dive deep into specific aspects of the topic to understand key concepts and ideas, fostering a deep and nuanced understanding of the content. This is also an opportunity to acquire new learning strategies, working methods, and skills.
Our presentation tool can be used by students to test what they remember through quizzes or matching steps. They can also invite external experts and have a reflective conversation or interview with the person, either synchronously or asynchronously, via the interactive steps.
Our mind map tool can be used for deep dives as students, individually or in groups, build out a mind map based on what they learn along the way. Here, they can gradually build, categorize, and visualize their increasingly deeper knowledge.
Our book tool can be used to read multimodal texts from the library or those created by the teacher. Students can also take notes or create audio or video logs of what they are learning.
Students can study videos or podcasts from the library or created by the teacher. They can also create audio or video logs of what they are learning along the way.
For reflection:
How can AI contribute?
Our AI can create stimulating questions in mind maps and books based on the teacher’s planning, helping students dive deeper into the topic.
Now it’s time for students to create creative and engaging products or perform actions that allow them to demonstrate their competence based on their individual capabilities. Through concretization, they can practically showcase the knowledge (such as conceptual understanding), skills, and aspects of personal development they have acquired during the period. They must, in some way, demonstrate their increased insight through words, products, and actions. This phase is crucial for enabling students to apply theoretical knowledge to practical, tangible forms.
Students can create interactive presentations that make it more engaging and educational for the audience to watch the presentation.
Our mind map tool can be used for brainstorming or as a knowledge bank intended for presentation. Students can receive support along the way through formative assessment from the AI learning assistant.
Our book tool can be used as a platform to showcase competence by having students create a multimodal product with text, images, videos, audio files, drawings, etc. Students can receive help from the AI assistant, to refine the product through its formative assessment. Storylab is great for digitizing analog learning processes, such as outdoor school projects. The products can be presented digitally or printed and displayed on the wall.
Students can create exciting podcasts or videos. These can range from imaginative stories, explanatory videos, news reports, to the digitalization of skill training.
For reflection:
How can AI contribute?
In book and mind map, AI can provide formative feedback on student work, which frees up time for you as a teacher in the classroom to focus on relationship-building.
Reflective dialogue involves conversations that strengthen and internalize the acquired competencies. Here, we help students reflect on the product they created in the concretization phase. When thinking about formative assessment, it’s possible that, based on these reflections, students may refine the product before finalizing it. If the students didn’t present in the concretization phase, this is an appropriate time for them to showcase what they’ve created and explain the thinking behind their process. This provides a good opportunity for students to learn from each other, but it’s important to ensure the class doesn’t become passive recipients during this phase. It’s also crucial to reflect on the learning process itself with the students: What went well, what did they learn the most from, and what can we do differently next time? This phase provides a platform for students to articulate their learning journey, offer insights, and engage in constructive discourse, thus enhancing their understanding and appreciation not just of the subject but also of the process. These reflections are essential because they highlight the learning and allow us to carry those lessons into the next cycle of the model.
Our presentation tool is great for summarizing and reflecting on student products and the learning process. Students can upload resources directly into the presentation, which can then be displayed on the large screen to compare and inspire each other. Here, students can also answer reflective questions using mind maps or open-ended tasks. Sometimes it’s fun to have a matching task or a quiz to see what students remember from the period and from each other’s work. You can generate a report for the entire class or individual students, allowing you and the students to see how their contributions helped the class’s collective learning.
Our mind map tool can be used as a presentation tool, or it can serve as a starting point for subject-specific discussions.
Our book tool can be used as a presentation tool or serve as a starting point for subject-specific discussions. Students can also develop a multimodal reflection log.
Students can create a video or audio file where they reflect on their work and the learning process.
In Course, teachers can conduct both formative and summative assessments. Once student work is complete and reflections on the learning process have been conducted, tasks can be marked as finished and the period archived if desired. Student work that will be used in the student’s portfolio can be saved, but it is important to establish routines for regularly deleting other student work, as this is a GDPR requirement in some municipalities.
For reflection:
How can AI contribute?
Our AI can summarize student input, show the breadth of students’ thinking, create reflective questions, and provide suggestions for further initiatives based on students’ reflections and feedback on the learning process. In Course, AI can assist teachers with assessment by generating draft feedback based on the work students have submitted during the period. The teacher can decide when and how many times they wish to provide feedback during the period, it doesn’t have to be only at the end.
Progressive Pedagogy at Learnlab involves student-centered learning where students learn by acting and producing, tailored to individual needs with the opportunity to be creative and engaged, and by reflecting on the learning process. This approach is inspired by the theories of renowned educators and psychologists such as John Dewey, Lev Vygotsky, Maria Montessori, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Howard Gardner, and Michael Fullan. These theories promote an educational system that values practical learning, critical thinking, and reflection—principles that are embedded in both the pedagogical content and the technological development of the Learnlab platform. Learnlab aims to foster an environment where learning is not only informative but also transformational, promoting personal growth and societal contributions.
John Dewey: Experience-Based Education and Reflective Thinking
John Dewey, a philosopher and educational reformer, argued for an experience-centered education, emphasizing that learning occurs through experience and reflection on those experiences. Dewey believed that education should prepare students to fully engage with their society and environment, encouraging a continuous cycle of action and reflection that enhances both personal and intellectual growth. Learnlab offers digital tools that support reflection and student production. Presentation is particularly beneficial for reflection, while Book, Mind map, Video and Podcast serve as excellent student production tools. Additionally, the AI assistant is developed to help students reflect on what they have achieved and what they can do next. For “learning by doing,” we recommend combining our platform with analog student activities to leverage the strengths of experience-based learning, creative student productions, and thoughtful reflections.
Real-World Applications: Dewey’s idea that education should be closely tied to real-world experiences is a cornerstone of Learnlab’s approach, where teachers are encouraged to create rich tasks that engage students with their local environment and showcase their products to a broad audience, not always just the class.
Lev Vygotsky: Mediated Learning, The Zone of Proximal Development, and Scaffolding
Lev Vygotsky, a key figure in psychology and education, introduced and laid the foundation for several key concepts that have had significant influence on modern pedagogical practices. Central to his theory is the idea of mediated learning, which postulates that learning occurs through interaction with one’s social environment, particularly through tools and language. This interaction often occurs within the “Zone of Proximal Development” (ZPD), which is the difference between what a learner can do independently and what they can achieve with guidance. Learnlab facilitates mediated social learning where students receive support (scaffolding) through technology, with language, collaborative learning, and AI support being central.
Maria Montessori: Emphasis on Self-Directed, Hands-On Learning (and “Peace”)
Maria Montessori revolutionized early childhood education by introducing a child-centered approach that emphasizes practical, self-directed learning within a carefully prepared environment. Her philosophy is based on the idea that children learn best when they are free to explore materials and concepts at their own pace, guided by intrinsic motivation rather than external rewards or pressure. Learnlab’s various tools, such as Mind map, Book, Video and Podcast, facilitate such exploration in interaction with both analog and other digital sources. Montessori’s focus on “peace” in a broad sense is something we support at Learnlab by creating thought-provoking content that can contribute to socially engaged citizens who seek both external and internal peace. For sensory-based and active learning, we recommend using our platform in combination with experience-based learning in the real world. Our learning assistant, helps students have a more self-directed learning process, providing help when needed and allowing teachers to focus their support where it’s most needed.
Ludwig Wittgenstein: Philosophy of Language and Learning
Ludwig Wittgenstein, a pivotal figure in modern philosophy, greatly influenced the understanding of language and its role in learning. He argued that the meaning of words depends on context, and that language gains its meaning from its use in various “forms of life.” We understand a concept only when it is used in practice. Therefore, we focus on having students concretize learning through products and actions, and these become the basis for demonstrating competence. This perspective encourages a focus on practical language use within specific activities and communities, emphasizing the importance of context in communication and understanding. Learnlab’s AI assistant, is designed to engage students in language use rooted in the teacher’s chosen learning objectives and key concepts for the topic.
Howard Gardner: Theory of Multiple Intelligences
Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences has had a significant impact on educational philosophy by suggesting that intelligence is not a single general ability, but rather distinct dimensions. According to Gardner, education should be tailored to individual strengths and learning styles to maximize students’ potential.
Particularly linguistic, logical-mathematical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and critical evaluation are areas where the Learnlab platform excels in developing students. For the other types of intelligence, it depends on the activities the teacher sets up in planning. Analog activities can be easily integrated with digital activities on the Learnlab platform.
Michael Fullan: Deep Learning
Michael Fullan, a renowned educational researcher best known for his thoughts on deep learning, is a major inspiration for LK-20. Fullan identifies six crucial competencies—often referred to as the six Cs—that are essential for students in the 21st century:
Hargreaves & Shirley: Student Engagement
Dennis Shirley and Andy Hargreaves highlight the need for a better balance between performance and well-being in schools. They have identified five pathways that promote and five that hinder student engagement. The hindrances include dissatisfaction, disconnection from school and curriculum, dissociation from societal norms, disempowerment, and distraction. To promote student engagement, the focus must be on mastery, empowerment, intrinsic value in schoolwork, understanding the importance of what one is learning, and linking learning to the culture one is part of.
Digital tools can enhance engagement when used with clear goals and purpose, while standardized tests are seen as the arch-enemy of student engagement. At Learnlab, we work towards period-based teaching that promotes relevance, mastery, and student involvement, based on a portfolio mindset. This has previously been challenging for teachers, but with AI, this task is now easier. We offer learning resources that teachers can copy and adapt to local conditions. In addition, we have a strong focus on Sami content, which supports a language and culture under great pressure.