Journal of the European Honors Council (May 2018)

Powerful Learning Environments: A Guide to Designing Innovation Labs

  • Ineke Miltenburg,
  • Ron Weerheijm

DOI
https://doi.org/10.31378/jehc.5
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 2, no. 1

Abstract

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The RUAS Honors Program aims to encourage students to develop into excellent professionals. To do so, RUAS has developed a competence profile entitled Learning to Innovate. This profile serves as a guide for designing a teaching approach which enables students to actively develop into such professionals. There are five crucial characteristics for designing learning environments which challenge students to master the said competence profile: a multidisciplinary issue drawn from actual practice; an authentic learning environment; professional excellence as both the aim and basis for assessment; qualified teachers setting high standards for their students; and working and learning in a Community of Learners made up of all those involved. In this paper, we first explain the essence of an Innovation Lab or I-lab. We then present some additional considerations and various different approaches to designing a powerful learning environment like the I-Lab.

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