I have worked closely with a few different schools as both a Creative Practitioner and as an Agent. I have also worked with primary and early years settings. Most recently as an Early Years Creative Agent.

Creative Learning in Schools & the Early Years
I’ve worked across a range of schools and Early Years settings as both a Creative Practitioner and Agent, including Lead Creative Schools and Early Years initiatives. My work is rooted in the belief that creativity isn’t just an arts skill – it’s a way of thinking and being. It’s about questioning, imagining differently, making connections, solving problems, and noticing the world with curiosity. These are skills children carry with them throughout life.

In Early Years settings, I work alongside educators and children to invite them to experiences that respond to their rhythms, interests, and questions. Play, exploration, outdoor learning, language, and sensory engagement are central. The work isn’t about imposing a plan – it’s about noticing what children are drawn to, shaping activities around that, and creating conditions where curiosity, agency, and imagination can grow.

At St Mary’s, the ethos was that every child is already a leader of their own learning. Children’s ideas guided the flow of activity, play became inquiry, making became meaning, and adults facilitated by noticing, reflecting, and opening space rather than directing. Leadership in learning was distributed across the room, across relationships, and across moments of attention and action. They told their own story of Newtown and shaped it’s future. Leading to co designing maps and writing letters to get support for our school. We got funding offers and charities to help support us

At Ysgol Penparc, Aberteifi, I worked as a Creative Practitioner on a project that combined imaginative play, curiosity, and community exploration. The Teddy Bears’ Picnic became a playful starting point to explore cynefin – from the life of insects in the school garden to the wider web of community connections. Children moved between observing, imagining, and mapping, creating links between their immediate environment, each other, and the world beyond the school. The project was community, school, and pupil-led, encouraging children to see themselves as part of a network, noticing patterns and relationships at every scale.

Across all settings, I also collaborate with Welsh-language artists and creative professionals to deepen learning. Examples include poet Anni Pen Llyn, clog dancer Tudur Phillips, digital artist Claire Wilkins, food critic Lowri Haf Cooke, and muralist Rhiannon Roberts. Projects are co-produced, responsive to children, educators, and communities, and centred on building curiosity, confidence, and creative agency.

 

Whether in Early Years classrooms, St Mary’s, or Ysgol Penparc, the same principle holds: creativity, agency, and co-creation are central to learning, growth, and meaningful participation.

More about Lead Schools can be found here