Hi and welcome to your dashboard.

–

Download our range of teaching resources on this page, feel free to use them, hack them, find inspiration or shift your attitude.

–

We support open access and sharing, and send and share content and materials and ingenious fixes far and wide, but the Fixperts name is protected by trademark to ensure it reflects our values and quality standards. Please use our name and our materials respectfully.

–

–

Fixperts for schools – introduction

Start here! This will get you started with a basic guide to all the below, a project timeline and FAQs. It also has the ‘Introduction to Fixing’ presentation which can be used with any of the individual activities below.

–

Click to download

1. Big ideas

Get acquainted with some fundamental concepts, such as designing as problem-solving, or what a human-centred design process is. Nice to meet you!

–

Click to download

2. Getting started

What’s a good design brief? This pack will help you figure that out by ‘Brief Hunting’ and modelling problems through a ‘Simulations’ workshop.

–

Click to download

3. Discovery

Is the first idea ever the best? Learn to fail better through generating lots of ideas. And once you’ve done that, generate a few more for good measure.

–

Click to download

4. Development

Now you’re on your way, but not too quickly. If the devil is in the detail then this pack is pure evil.

–

Click to download

5. Production

Yes you’ve been learning through making, but your final prototype needs to move things along.

–

Click to download

6. Presentation

It’s your moment: make it a good one. Knowing what your story is, as well as how to tell it, means you’ve taken control of your own learning. Congratulations!

–

Click to download

Fixperts logos

Use the Fixperts logo across your platforms and within Fix Films.

–

Click to download
[/fusion_gallery]

Share your Fixperts project so we can share it on?

Complete the form below to tell us about your Fixperts project. This allows us to better understand activity and develop insight and evaluation. Within the form we will ask:

  • School name
  • Year and month of the project start
  • Length of course in weeks 
  • Number of students
  • Which Fixperts resources did you use?
  • What were your teaching goals? 
  • Did you run any special events?
  • What is the most memorable moment?
  • Would you be happy for us to contact you to discuss an Insights post to share this information more widely on the Fixperts website?

–

Click here to access the project form

–

You are unauthorised to view this page. Please log in or click here to sign up to access this information.

Here’s a selection of our most common questions.

Download the Introduction to Fixperts for the complete FAQs.

Fixperts is an education programme which challenges students to create ingenious solutions to everyday problems. Rooted in a creative, human-centred design process, it integrates Design & Technology, engineering thinking and practical making skills.

We offer free guidelines and materials to universities and schools to allow them to run Fixperts projects independently. We offer support in the form of training, facilitation advice and extended /bespoke materials.

We do this because we think the world desperately needs creative problem solvers, who combine ingenuity with empathy and resilience. We started in universities and have moved to working with schools because this is where we can make the most difference to the innovators of tomorrow.

Fixperts, and its sister programme FixCamp, are conceived and run by the people at Forth – a community interest company who believe in the power of creativity as a tool for social change.

We are run by a small group of individuals with deep expertise in design education and public engagement.

We support open access and sharing, and send and share content and materials and ingenious fixes far and wide, but the Fixperts name is protected by trademark to ensure it reflects our values and quality standards. Please use our name and our materials respectfully.

Fixperts always involves fixing something for someone else. All Fixperts projects challenge participants:

  • To solve problems creatively, which encourages agency, resourcefulness and resilience
  • To fix for someone else (the Fix Partner), which encourages generosity, empathy and a
    social orientation
  • To work in teams, which encourages collaboration, negotiation and respect
  • To gift the solution to the Fix Partner which develops generosity, inclusion and community
  • To tell their story, which encourages insight, perspective and critical skills
  • To do all this in real life, which encourages community engagement, requires prototyping and making skills and to bring it to completion, and to share their ideas openly, contributing to an innovation culture.

In all formats, even the shortest, students can experience the key values that Fixperts promotes, such as empathy, design for social good, prototyping, and teamwork. If you need advice on how to adapt Fixperts to your situation, please get in touch.

The Fixperts model can be adapted to suit your situation. You can run Fixperts as a one- hour, half day, whole day or half-termly project. You can use it to introduce a subject, such as human-centred design. It doesn’t matter if you’re in a classroom using lolly sticks or in a workshop using a 3D printer – successful Fixperts projects don’t rely on sophisticated tools!

Fixperts projects have been successfully tried and tested with a very wide age range – from 4 to 80. There is no age limit, but content needs to be adapted to suit the group you are working with.

Any creative groups who are looking to solve problems through design and engineering will benefit from a Fixperts project. Younger learners will need more support and older pupils can enjoy a greater level of autonomy. Fixperts is well-suited to Design & Technology, Art, Engineering, and PSHE programmes of study.

A full Fixperts project is particularly suited to KS3 and KS4.

Fixperts has extremely direct and obvious affinities with Design & Technology and other STEM subjects – art, science, engineering, PSHE/citizenship and even music teachers have all already engaged with Fixperts. However, Fixperts does benefit from some knowledge and understanding of materials, tools and making, so having a teacher or technician with these skills on hand can be very useful.