Life Lab
Today’s Students. Tomorrow’s World.
Resilience, Creative and Analytical problem solving
An engaging program for young people to achieve their potential in cognitive and psychological flexibility through an innovative and integrated Curriculum based learning program. Aimed to bolster youth, teaching them skills that young people need to acquire; Resilience, Creative and Analytical problem solving through logical, flexible, strategic and adventurous thinking and hands-on experiential learning opportunities.
Audience and Objectives
The main objectives of the program include;
- To correctly identify life situations in three categories; (Problems to solve, Polarities to manage, Life situations to cope with)
- To use the appropriate problem-solving strategies and tools for each situation; solving complex problems effectively.
- Supporting young people to build their own portfolio of skills and develop flexibility to address each situation
- Having young people use present moment awareness so they can make effective choices for themselves; Responding rather than reacting.
- To induce the capacity to communicate with empathy, embrace difference and neurological and cultural diversity.
As facilators of the program, we do not assume to know what is good for everyone – rather, we aim to provide resources which empower young people, offering applicable strategies for them to make more effective choices needed to arrive closer to their ideal outcome.
This program is designed to be practical and relatable to all youth ages and capabilities. Each concept is personable and speaks to the whole-self.
Participants gain additional insights to their preferred ways of thinking, learning and doing for themselves and for others.
Mediation techniques used include drawing, LEGO® Serious Play® methodology, Drumming techniques, Puppets and the Empathy Toy®. These can be adapted to the resources available.
Each lesson incorporates individual and group reflections. Part of the learning is being able to recognise when help is needed and effectively seeking help.
Skills developed
Further skills which are developed relating to the curriculum include:
- Listening
- Sharing
- Participating
- Storytelling
- Situational awareness
- Problem Solving
- Personal creativity
- Critical and Creative thinking
- Social and Emotional Capabilities
Your facilitators
Mark Harling
Senior Consultant | Facilitator | Therapist
I am a business consultant – creative facilitator – Person Centred Approach therapist. I support individuals and organisations on their transformation journeys, helping them create the conditions for success.
After training as a Mechanical engineer and many years in multiple industries solving complex technical problems, I was facing a wall: my role required me to engage 2700 people in one direction and I just didn’t know how to do that. Thus started a journey of personal discovery and growth that eventually led me to become a Person Centred Approach therapist and supervisor. Over time, I have learnt to integrate seamlessly my industrial experience and personal development skills in my work, creating meaningful impacts on company culture in the fields of manufacturing performance, innovation, and strategy. I now specializes in corporate strategy and transformation through culture change, helping organizations to evolve towards new natural habits of thinking and doing. I use applied creativity and Lego Serious Play to support my work on social innovation and applied complexity.
I’m an eternal learner and questioner. I seek to make a contribution to people and organisations reaching their full potential. During our time together, I will strive to help you understand your strengths and gain awareness about your inner processes.
Angela Pezzano
Educator | Facilitator | Dot Joiner
With over 20 years’ experience in the Education and Creative sectors, I have a strong passion and understanding of the role of creative problem solving for teams and individuals. This has been the drive for me to find tools, techniques and people to allow for collaborative, empathetic and engaging opportunities.
My various education, experience and roles have gifted me significant knowledge and skills in teaching, project management, broad stakeholder engagement and workshop facilitation. Integrating diverse elements such as LEGO® Serious Play®, The Empathy Toy® and Music/Drama Story Sharing platforms allows me to provide an innovative, adaptable and potential-seeking approach to me professional and personal being – inviting people to think differently therefore do differently.
Not afraid of asking the hard questions, I consider that conversations are about listening and usually always worth having and that they just aren’t as complete until they include a “Yes, and..” or “What if…”
Blog: What’s going on with Life Lab?
World Economic Forum and LifeLab
At LifeLab, we are aware that the children of today will shape the world of tomorrow, hence our motto “Today’s Students. Tomorrow’s World”. We teach children to think for themselves by enriching their life skills at problem solving, whatever the nature of the problem....
LifeLab©: Today’s Students. Tomorrow’s World
LifeLab©, an outstanding in-school program, teaches youth to listen to self and others, taking responsibility for their actions, learning critical and creative thinking, social and emotional capabilities. The program develops essential self-management skills. It helps...
Growing turtles
As our students finished Term 3, we asked them to think back to the start of the year. One of our first lessons had them building a little turtle with their LifeLab© LEGO® kit by following the instructions that we had given to them. 7 months later, the students are...
Empathy Busy Bees
Angela Pezzano and I have been keeping busy in the LifeLab©, developing and delivering this program to Primary School aged children. It aims to build skills of resilience in children, help them to find strategies to solve the problems they have in their daily lives,...
When we hear voices…
When we are parenting our children or educating our students, we greatly influence their development, sometimes consciously, sometimes involuntarily. We take on the role of people who know and think we know what to do with the methodology whereas if we put these...
Screen freeze on empathy
‘Glitches’ didn’t always exist in our vocabulary. As we’ve been working and learning remotely much more recently due to COVID-19, we’ve experienced these on our screens and seen our faces in frozen poses we’d rather forget. Do we perhaps notice the glitches with...
Parents of Life long learners get involved
As our students in Victoria province, Australia, experience some trepidation in returning to online learning, there is some encouragement in having received such positive feedback from parents, teachers and students saying LifeLab online is something they can look...
An emotion lasts 90 seconds
In her book A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey, brain researcher Jill Bolte Taylor says that an emotion lasts only 90 seconds. She contends that if it lasts longer than that, we have added some personal story to it and chosen to let that brain circuit...
A little temptation
If I had learned about instant and delayed gratification as an 8 year old, I may have made a few different choices as I grew up. This concept was taught in our Life Lab Lesson through a modified version of the marshmallow experiment. We wanted to teach students about...
How are the adults doing?
We asked students if they think their parents had a good balance between responsibilities and having fun? Quite unanimously, the shaking of the heads and “No way” being called out gave us the answer. There were ah-ha moments when students realised that making a choice...
“Mediting” does the job
As part of our return to classroom learning, we held conversations with our Life Lab students to reflect upon online learning; Here are a few ingredients worth keeping in the learning pot from our Year 1 and 2 students on their experience of distance learning. Whilst...
Sol-You-tion
Am I part of the solution? The children reflected this week about various types of life situations and whether they feel they should get involved to solve them or not. There were no correct answers, only an understanding of what motivated them. If the neighbour’s...
Testimonials: Why we get up in the morning
As COVID-19 sweeps the world and life as we know it has been turned on its head, the LifeLab program has been of invaluable support for my daughter to work through a myriad of emotions and challenges that the pandemic has unleashed. My daughter particularly enjoyed the problem mapping exercises, in which she drew and worked through troubles that she was facing. The process itself was a lot of fun and it really helped elucidate her personal life struggles, reduce her anxiety and improve her wellbeing. There couldn’t be a more important time than now for my daughter to be practising the life skills learned through LifeLab.
I just wanted to drop you a note, providing feedback on the LifeLab sessions you ran last year. LifeLab was my sons absolute favourite thing to do during the lockdown. He would line up his LEGO so that he was ready to go well before the lesson commenced. I was a little hesitant, as I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect. It teaches the children that everyone does see things differently and how to work through a problem and a great way for the younger children to provide non verbal responses to your questions.I particularly loved the extra effort you made with the upbeat music and the end of your session, a great way to end a positive time. While we are extremely disappointed that home schooling is again a reality, programs like LifeLab is a key enabler to keep our kids engaged and connected. A big thank you also from my son.
I found the sessions to be highly practical and hands on giving the children loads of flexibility while they are learning about everyday problems that require solving. This is so important for developing future life and work skills where innovation and problem solving are essential in the 21st century. As a parent, this is something I want my child to be prepared for.
My 6 and almost 8 year old looked forward to their LifeLab sessions with Angela every time. They smiled with anticipation as the lessons started.
I think it’s a valuable interaction on the virtual platform for all the children (and parents – as it’s the only time they don’t seem to need to be assisted).
Angela engages the children with creative learning, allowing them to solve various problems in a fresh and fun, playful way through LEGO. This definitely keeps the children interested. Learning with choices is very clever. Angela has a way of connecting with all the children, as she is great and has clear communication which helps the children stayed focused.
It is a fantastic blend of learning language, literacy and numeracy skills, developing fine motor skills and encouraging creativity all at the same time.
All abilities and learning styles are catered for in this program making it highly appealing to me as a parent. With my daughter being a highly creative and visual learner, her needs were supported, she was engaged and she thrived.
I particularly loved how children worked individually on their problems using the “Who what when where and why” model to help them to make decisions regarding their solutions. This is a skill I highly value and one that I forget to use as an adult. This highlights how the program encourages life long learners. Learners that are ready for their future.
Angela Pezzano is a great facilitator, directing the children enough but also giving them heaps of autonomy, independence and encouragement.
It worked so well during remote learning, so I could only imagine how interactive it would be in a face to face session.
As the name suggests, LifeLab is a great resource for life, it’s a brilliant addition to mainstream learning and I feel it should be incorporated into the curriculum of all year levels.
Life Lab was a highlight of my two children’s remote learning. Angela captured my children’s attention and had them engaged throughout her session. They smiled whilst building and enjoyed the interaction with Angela. Chloe loved putting the Lego together and enjoyed how Angela delivered the class involving her and her friends. Noah loves Lego but also enjoyed solving life issues with face to face learning.
Hi Miss Angela thanks for the lovely lesson
Just a really quick email to say I think Life Lab is brilliant. I really am very impressed with the whole idea of it all and I think Angela is wonderful.
Just wanted to send a big THANK YOU for organising the Life Lab Lego session this week. [My child] really enjoyed your session, especially to be able to work with Lego, see his friends on the screen and working with his classmates again put a huge smile on his face. It was awesome to see. Well done.