Creative Momentum. Encouraging Engagement in Learners, Building Confidence and Resilience

A toolkit for teachers, tutors, and creative mentors who want to inspire, motivate, and transform their learners.
A clear, warm and experience-driven guide for anyone teaching or supporting Art and Design students. Written by an educator with over thirty years in the classroom, this book offers practical strategies for motivating learners, building creative routines, improving productivity, and helping students develop confidence in their own ideas.
It explores what makes Art and Design different from other subjects, why students often struggle with procrastination or self-doubt, and how teachers can guide them through the challenges of independent creative work. The book includes a range of engaging starter activities, advice on formative assessment and meaningful feedback, approaches to scaffolding, ideas for competitions and drawing sessions, and methods for helping students catch up when they fall behind.
At its heart, this is a book about putting students first and unlocking their potential, whatever their ability or background. It brings together decades of real classroom practice with thoughtful reflections on teaching, creativity, motivation and the changing culture of young people today.
Perfect for Art and Design teachers, tutors, workshop leaders, trainee teachers, and anyone who wants to inspire growth, curiosity and confidence in their learners.
You will Find:
Sitting Down Next to Them. Assessment that actually changes something
Closing the Loop how to turn targets into action
Creative starter activities (including Which Is Most Real? and What Question Am I Going to Ask You?
The power of drawing for momentum and confidence
How to help students work beyond the classroom
Using competitions, exhibitions, and peer feedback to boost engagement
Building routines that anchor creativity
Understanding the unique pressures of Art & Design compared to other subjects
And much more all delivered with compassion, and honesty
A Book Made for Teachers
This book celebrates the art classroom as a place of possibility. It reminds us that creativity is not a straight line, and that students thrive when we sit beside them figuratively and literally and help them find what they can do well.
This book is ideal for:
Art & Design teachers high school and above
Art tutors, community educators, and workshop leaders
Heads of Department and trainee teachers
Anyone supporting creative learners or managing studio-based courses
Artists who want insight into teaching, motivation, and the creative process