Factory of learning

Aims of the tool

. To support daily and on-going reflection during the activity
· To increase awareness of personal and group learning processes
· To identify and document learning outcomes as they occur.

Description of the tool

Introduce participants to the ‘factory’ metaphor. The main product of the factory is the learning within the activity (youth exchange, training course or EVS).
Put posters on the wall with the following titles and questions:
1) Ingredients – What did you personally put into the learning process?
2) Machines – What kind of settings did your learning take place in?
3) Personnel – Were there any other people involved?
4) Product – What did you learn and how do you know you learnt it?
5) Operator – How did you feel during the activity (emotions)?
6) Marketing and sales – What is the value of your learning? Where can you use your
experience afterwards?
Introduce par ticipants to the poster wall at the end of the first day of your activity and explain that
it is the space for their daily reflection on learning. In a youth exchange or training course, give
participants 30-45 minutes at the end of each day to reflect on the questions on the wall. At the same
time, encourage them to use the ‘factory’ as an on-going reflection tool and invite them to write down
or illustrate their learning whenever they feel like it.
On the last day of the activity, give participants two hours to work on the self-assessment for
Youthpass certificate (part three of the certificate). Ask participants to work in smaller groups and
identify their learning outcomes by looking at the wall. They can take different elements from each
poster to document their learning outcomes in the self-assessment part of the Youthpass.

During this two hour session, the facilitator
can also introduce the background, history
and concept of Youthpass, including some
guiding questions for ‘key competences’.
After this, par ticipants should have individual
time to write down their own learning
outcomes (in order to prepare the Youthpass
cer tificates). Participants are invited to do so
in a dialogue with other participants.