OpenStudios for Educators
Design learning people can work within.
Create guided environments where inquiry, collaboration, project development and reflection become part of the learning experience.
Learning between instruction and submission
Create rich experiences centred on inquiry and project development.
OpenStudios was developed to help educators create rich learning experiences centred on inquiry, experimentation, reflection and project development.
While many educational platforms are designed primarily around content delivery and assessment management, OpenStudios focuses on the learning processes that occur between instruction and submission.
It provides a space where learners can investigate challenges, document progress, share evidence, develop ideas and engage with feedback throughout an evolving project journey.
Whether supporting higher education, executive education, professional development or organisational learning, OpenStudios helps educators create environments that make thinking and learning more visible.
Designing the studio
Every learning experience begins with a purpose.
Educators can use OpenStudios to create structured studio environments organised around challenges, projects, opportunities, research questions or innovation activities.
This structure provides direction without eliminating flexibility, allowing learners to navigate their own path while remaining connected to shared goals.
- Project briefs
- Learning objectives
- Frameworks and templates
- Evidence collection activities
- Reflection prompts
- Collaborative spaces
- Resource collections
- Milestones and checkpoints
Project-based learning
Make projects the centre of the learning experience.
Project-based learning allows learners to apply knowledge in meaningful contexts. OpenStudios supports this approach by providing a dedicated environment where projects become the centre of the learning experience.
Learners can gather evidence, document decisions, create artefacts, plan activities, capture feedback and demonstrate progress over time.
Rather than viewing projects as isolated assessment tasks, OpenStudios treats them as ongoing journeys of investigation, experimentation and development. This helps learners understand not only what they produced, but how and why their work evolved.
Understanding learner thinking
See the development that outcomes alone cannot reveal.
Understanding learner thinking is one of the greatest challenges facing educators. Traditional assessments often reveal outcomes but not the reasoning, assumptions, decisions and experiences that produced them.
OpenStudios encourages learners to document their journey as it unfolds. This visibility creates opportunities for more meaningful support and more targeted feedback.
- Emerging ideas
- Lines of inquiry
- Research activities
- Reflection processes
- Decision making
- Collaboration patterns
- Iterations and refinements
Collaboration
Create, share and refine work together.
Complex challenges increasingly require collaboration across disciplines, perspectives and experiences.
OpenStudios supports individual and group learning by providing shared spaces where participants can contribute ideas, exchange feedback and collectively develop solutions.
Collaboration becomes more than a discussion forum. It becomes an active process of creating, sharing and refining work together. This allows learners to experience the benefits and challenges of teamwork while developing the communication and collaboration capabilities expected in contemporary workplaces.
Feedback during development
Support growth while work can still evolve.
Feedback is most valuable when it occurs during development rather than after completion. OpenStudios enables educators to provide guidance at critical moments throughout a learner's journey.
Because work evolves within the studio environment, feedback can be linked directly to evidence, reflections, concepts and project activities. The emphasis shifts from evaluating completed work to supporting ongoing growth.
- Early intervention
- Continuous improvement
- Scaffolded learning
- Reflection on feedback
- Iterative development
Reflection and application
Connect experience, theory and future action.
Reflection is often recognised as important yet is frequently separated from project work. OpenStudios integrates reflection directly into the learning process.
Learners can record insights, identify challenges, evaluate decisions and document key moments as they occur. This creates a richer understanding of learning while helping participants connect experience with future action. For educators, reflective records provide valuable insight into learner development that may otherwise remain hidden.
Frameworks, models and disciplinary knowledge can also be embedded directly within project activities, allowing learners to use theory while addressing real or simulated challenges. This helps learners appreciate not only what a concept means, but when, why and how it can be applied.
Where it can be used
Adaptable across learning contexts.
Its flexibility allows educators to design experiences that align with their own teaching philosophies, learning outcomes and contexts.
- 01Undergraduate education
- 02Postgraduate programs
- 03MBA and Executive MBA teaching
- 04Professional development
- 05Industry projects
- 06Innovation programs
- 07Community engagement initiatives
- 08Organisational learning and change projects
Shaping the learning environment
Turn educational aspirations into practice.
Educational spaces shape the way people learn. When environments prioritise inquiry, reflection, collaboration and experimentation, learners are more likely to develop the capabilities needed to navigate complexity and uncertainty.
OpenStudios was created to support this shift. Rather than functioning solely as a place to access information or submit work, it provides a space where ideas can grow, projects can evolve and learning can become visible.
For educators seeking to create engaging, project-based and human-centred learning experiences, OpenStudios offers a practical framework for turning those aspirations into reality.
Explore the 5E Design Thinking Framework →Explore the environment