Idea Lab

The Idea Lab in the Lafayette Campus Enrichment Center is a space for hands-on, collaborative learning open to all Lower School grade levels. Most of the work students undertake in the Idea Lab centers on design thinking and problem solving, which emphasize innovative thinking and the iterative process.

The Idea Lab is a place for:

creativity
exploration
building empathy
collaboration
prototyping
flexibility

critical thinking
problem-solving
discovery
ownership of learning
deep dives
failing forward

Through projects and challenges, students have fun while they are held accountable for their work and their learning. They develop important cognitive and affective skills, such as problem solving, perseverance, collaboration, and creative, critical, and logical thinking.

Examples of work done in the Idea Lab:

PK4 students extended a lesson on force and motion by designing and building roller coasters using cardboard tubes and boxes.
Second graders combined a unit on weather patterns and design thinking to design and build boats that could protect a LEGO figure in a variety of bad weather situations, which were simulated using a kiddie pool.
Science teacher Beverly Burgin often schedules time for her third through fifth-grade science students in the Idea Lab as an extension of science labs for activities related to subjects such as force and motion, simple machines, and circuits. View our Fly on the Wall video about how moon craters are made below.
Fifth-grade students have worked on multiple long-term, interdisciplinary projects, including: a design thinking/art collaboration that resulted in their designs being professionally manufactured for use as signs in and around the Idea Lab, and a design thinking/art/science collaboration that resulted in a large-scale installation of the human digestive system that visitors could walk through as part of a guided, interactive tour.

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Ashleigh D'Aunoy

Director of Enrichment, Innovation, and Talent Development

(337) 993-2263 x430

Episcopal School of Acadiana

Episcopal School of Acadiana is a private coeducational day school for students in grades PK3 through 12. Our mission is to instill in every student the habits of scholarship and honor.