A teacher at Challney Girls High School wasn’t sure what to expect from a Young Foresight Mentor from Varley Gear Pumps and he was more than a little nervous. But they needn’t have worried. As the teacher put it, “His input was brilliant. A wonderful environment for team teaching existed. We had different fields of expertise so students received a ‘total learning experience’. The mentor’s enthusiasm was recognised by the students and as a consequence they related extremely well. The mentor also provided publications and websites from industry that pertained to the work being covered.” The mentor echoed this. “I am lucky to have a teacher who is responsive to my input. The teacher is very easy to work with. We work as a team, mutually supporting each other.

However, the teacher is (rightly) in overall control directing the children and the lesson.” The mentor added, “I have found it useful that I am NOT seen as a teacher in some instances, because then I can communicate on a different level.” The teacher was equally enthusiastic about the relevance and impact of Young Foresight on her Year 8 students.

She described this in her interview with Carolyn O’Donnell of Bedfordshire SETPOINT: The programme linked exceptionally well with the design & technology curriculum. The students had ‘ownership’ of their work from the very start. As a consequence they developed their own criteria for designs that really developed lateral thinking. They produced their own specifications that gave clear guidelines to refer to when designing. This meant they designed to meet the needs of the brief.

Their ongoing evaluation skills increased dramatically, they were encouraged to jot down ideas as they designed. Initially they only recorded positive aspects in a somewhat shallow manner, but they soon appreciated noting negative aspects is essential to development. Students at Challney like everything to be right, neat, perfect and familiar, so it was a challenge to break down this restrictive thinking. Young Foresight had a dramatic impact on pupils’ ability to generate ideas. The level of brainstorming was most noticeable. This led to far more innovative concept ideas. Initially, shallow, predictable ideas were produced but as time went on they started to show creativity and lateral thinking. I organised the lessons so that they could take their ideas to a small scale prototype stage which meant the students could run with amazing ideas that would have been restricted if they had made them full scale. The students related to risk taking, learning that ‘it is not a mistake’, simply something you need to evaluate to find ways of modifying/improving. Ian can have the last word about his experience. “It is completely worthwhile. I have gained confidence, knowledge and experience with children as well as a total respect for teachers. The initial brief was to enthuse about engineering to schools but I have ended up enthusing about schools to engineers!”