Bureau de Change Laboratory is a place for resource sharing and discussion about using the Change Laboratory and other forms of formative intervention research. It focusses on forms of research based on the twin principles of expansive learning and transformative agency by double stimulation. The intertwined aims are to intervene in the world to change real activity systems, to empower stakeholders, and to produce new knowledge within the process of change. The audience for this website are researchers who use, or wish to use, such approaches. Bureau de Change Laboratory is intended to host bitesize introductory materials, annotated artefacts from past research projects, and discussions of published research.
A historical analysis method for studies based on the Cultural-Historical Activity Theory
This study presents a historical analysis method grounded in the Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (CHAT), developed to reconstruct the developmental trajectory of an activity system. The method integrates the principle of historicity to identify critical events and phases of development. Based on the case of the Sustainable Swine Production Program (3S Program), the study demonstrates how historical events can be interpreted through analytical concepts such as period, historical events, critical events, phases of development, and the model of an activity system, revealing transformations in its object and structure. The theoretical contribution of the method lies in the operationalization of the principle of historicity in empirical research and in providing analytical tools to understand long-term changes in work activities. From a methodological perspective, the historical analysis method proposed herein offers researchers a systematic approach for examining data generated through formative interventions, such as those conducted within the Change Laboratory. From a practical standpoint, the method offers a framework for researchers and practitioners to analyze and support transformative processes in various contexts for the development of work and the resolution of social problems.
Copyright (c) 2025 Marco Antonio Pereira Querol (Author) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Formation of planning groups and data collection in a Change Laboratory
This article discusses strategies for planning a Change Laboratory (CL), with a focus on the formation of planning groups and the collection of mirror data. Planning is organized into three levels: (i) strategic, composed of researchers and decision makers, which aligns the intervention with organizational objectives; (ii) methodological, bringing together experienced and novice researchers, with an emphasis on method and peer learning; and (iii) operational, which involves researchers and participants in reflecting on the sessions and adapting the actions to practice. As for data collection, different methods can be used, such as interviews, shadowing, field visits and participant observation, in addition to workshop records, documents, questionnaires, videos, or the collection carried out by the participants themselves. Mirror data, by reflecting the reality of the activity, is fundamental to fostering discussions and promoting expansive learning. It is concluded that the methodological and operational groups strengthen the sustainability of learning, allowing their continuity beyond the sessions.
Copyright (c) 2025 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Negotiation and strategic planning of a Change Laboratory intervention
This article discusses the planning and negotiation of interventions with the Change Laboratory (CL) methodology, highlighting its application in diverse organizational contexts. CL, grounded in the Cultural Historic Activity Theory and expansive learning, requires a careful process of strategic, methodological, and operational alignment. Negotiation with strategic decision-makers, such as managers and politicians is presented as a continuous process of shared learning, essential to ensure adherence, institutional support and sustainability of the proposed changes. The text emphasizes the importance of the social construction of demand, in which researchers, managers and workers collectively identify problems and possibilities for development. Negotiation strategies in different organizational contexts are explored, from rigid hierarchical structures to more horizontal environments, highlighting the challenges of engagement and the need for methodological adaptation. It is concluded that the success of a CL depends on mutual trust, constant communication and the protagonism of the participants, ensuring lasting and significant transformations.
Copyright (c) 2025 Marco Antonio Pereira Querol, Rodolfo Andrade de Gouveia Vilela (Author) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Change Laboratory in Brazil: Origins, development, and dissemination
This article aims to present the trajectory and development of the formative intervention method of the Change Laboratory in Brazil. To this end, a narrative is constructed that articulates the author’s direct experience with a systematic review of publications available on the Google Scholar platform. The first publications on the method date from 2011 and 2012, followed by training courses, technical visits and exchanges. After an initial "gestation" period, the first interventions were implemented in 2014. Since then, at least 40 interventions have been carried out in the country, with a predominance in the areas of education, health, agriculture and occupational health surveillance. The analysis of the dissemination of the method among different research groups indicates that its adoption requires at least three key processes: formation, establishment of collaborative networks and creation of a local support group. It is concluded that, in view of the theoretical-methodological complexity of the Change Laboratory, it is essential to strengthen forms of inter- and intra-group research cooperation.
Strategies for the sustainability of expansive learning in a Change Laboratory
The Change Laboratory is an interventionist method that fosters expansive learning by enabling participants to identify contradictions in their collective activity system and collaboratively design new solutions. However, the sustainability of this learning beyond the intervention remains a challenge. This paper discusses strategies to strengthen the continuity of expansive learning processes after the formal closure of Change Laboratory interventions. Drawing on practical experiences, six categories of strategies are presented: (1) empowering interventionists through training and networking; (2) negotiating with strategic decision-makers to secure resources and support; (3) empowering participants with preparatory training; (4) adapting intermediate tools to connect abstract concepts with concrete practices; (5) combining intervention with complementary communication methods such as media, theater, and consultative meetings; and (6) creating parallel learning spaces to support planning and engagement. Together, these strategies aim to consolidate and extend the learning outcomes of Change Laboratory interventions by fostering the participants capacity to maintain the learning process by themselves and to expand it to other social spaces. The systematization of these practices offers guidance for researchers and practitioners seeking to ensure the long-term sustainability of expansive learning in organizational and societal contexts.
Potential practical outcomes and learning from a Change Laboratory
This paper examines the potential practical outcomes generated during and from Change Laboratory (CL) interventions. Based on my experiences from interventions from Brazil and Finland, the study emphasizes two key results: conceptual learning and structural transformative learning. Conceptual learning involves changes in how the participants understand themselves and their activity systems, enabling participants to recognize contradictions, strengthening collective agency, and co-design solutions. Structural transformative learning here refers to actual changes in the activity, such as the implementation of a new object-purpose and a new model of the activity. It may also include new tools, new models, new techniques, new rules, new division of models that may contribute to the resolution of the contradictions. To illustrative I use a case from an intervention in the activity of resocialization of adolescents in conflict with the law located in a center in São Paulo, Brazil. The case shows how CL enabled participants to reconceptualize problems and redesign their purpose, giving new meaning to the instrument - the Individual Care Plan, which started following a new principle of listening to the youth participation, and significantly reduced violence. The findings highlight that CL interventions can foster meaningful transformation. However, broader systemic changes require continuity, inter-institutional collaboration, and supportive policies.
Co-creating blended teaching activities using AI in TESOL contexts: Report of an online Change Laboratory pilot study
This report details a pilot study designed to inform a larger Ph.D. project that explores the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in TESOL contexts, specifically within blended learning environments for adult learners in China. The study was structured around four online Change Laboratory (CL) workshops held in 2024 and focused on how teaching staff—comprising one tutor and six TESOL teachers—adapt AI technologies in their work. These participants, drawn from online education companies, engage with AI for teaching, student management, and administrative tasks. The primary aim of this pilot study was to evaluate the design and execution of cross-cultural, participatory workshops, using the Change Laboratory methodology, and to derive actionable insights for refining both the Ph.D. project’s methodology and future interventions. One of the key findings highlighted the influence of cultural and linguistic diversity among participants, which presented unique opportunities and challenges in fostering active participation and co-creation of AI-integrated teaching practices.
Copyright (c) 2025 Bureau de Change Laboratory
Tools for transformation: Selecting a suite of digital tools for an online Change Laboratory
This technical report describes the set of digital tools that were used in a fully online Change Laboratory conducted over seven workshops in 2024 as part of the author’s Ph.D. Project “The Sustainability Change Laboratory.” The purpose of this report is to document the choices and design decisions the author made in the set-up of the digital space for the research project, to provide a categorisation of tools required to enable the various interactions between Change Laboratory participants, and to share the user experience of both participants and the researcher. The report also includes a set of criteria intended to assist other researchers planning a fully online Change Laboratory in their selection and choice of a digital toolset to be used.
Copyright (c) 2024 Bureau de Change Laboratory https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Cultural Historical Activity Theory as a tool for reimagining WIL: Conducting contradiction analysis workshops and the implications for Change Laboratory work
In this report we describe the rationale and structure for conducting a series of separate Cultural Historical Activity Theory-inspired contradiction analysis workshops focused on work-integrated learning. The events occurring in each separate workshop are then illustrated and the benefits gained from the participants’ perspectives are highlighted. Overall, participants clearly valued gaining a collective and systematic understanding of difficulties with their WIL initiatives. Furthermore, from the perspective of the researchers, the workshops appeared to identify motive and interest for participants to move further with a full-scale change laboratory.
Copyright (c) 2023 Bureau de Change Laboratory https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Editable activity system artefacts for use in Change Laboratory workshops
This entry concerns the use of editable activity systems provided as downloadable Powerpoint slides. Examples are given of how the slides might be used in live face-to-face workshops, or in online workshops facilitated through video conferencing platforms. The resource also provides graphical representations that can be used to analyse and describe systemic contradictions.
This technical submission was created collaboratively, by a group of researchers united by shared interests and experiences in conducting research online using the Change Laboratory methodology. Our current contribution seeks to inform and engage colleagues, setting out a collaborative response to a relatively unsophisticated yet reflexive and timely question: Why do an online Change Laboratory?
Designing a Change Laboratory outline plan
This technical report considers the process of designing an outline plan for a Change Laboratory research-intervention. It presents a table that can be used as the basis for producing such a plan and discusses the kind of design process that might occur, using the table, in the initial stages of the project. The technical report assumes that the research designer is a relative novice in using the Change Laboratory methodology and thus addresses some common issues and misconceptions that arise as research designers attempt to engage with the approach for the first time. Correspondingly, it assumes that the project is of a scale that can be carried out over a medium timespan (months, not years). The author bases much of the text on their experiences in supervising doctoral students undertaking Change Laboratory PhD projects: often studying part-time at a distance while working and situating their workplace as the research site.
Explaining the principles of Cultural Historical Activity Theory and the Change Laboratory to participants in a research intervention
This resource describes the approach I used to explain key concepts relating to Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) and the Change Laboratory to participants at the start of a synchronous, online Change Laboratory intervention I delivered over seven months as part of my PhD research during 2020/2021. The intervention was designed to allow a group of online educators to explore their professional development needs and engender changes in their workplace to optimise delivery of online teaching and learning for learners and for themselves. I start this resource by introducing the background to the Change Laboratory intervention before describing the purpose of the resource, explaining the approach I took to positioning key concepts of CHAT and the Change Laboratory with the study participants and offering some personal reflections on the intervention. I have also included materials for other researcher-interventionists to use as a possible starting point when designing and describing their own formative intervention to participants.
A history wall task for an online Change Laboratory workshop
This research attempts to document moving from a face to face, brick and mortar environment to online environment from a student’s perspective. This was investigated by using Cultural Historical Activity Theory as a starting point, and one on-line synchronous Change Laboratory to collaboratively co-create and document the experiences of students. It used two primary online tools to facilitate this process—Microsoft Teams and Microsoft OneNote. By using Microsoft OneNote as a tool, this allowed for synchronous online collaboration both between research and participants, and between the participants themselves. It demonstrates how this shared meaning and understanding of their new online environment (new activity system) in a live environment opened real time discussion of shared issues (contradictions) and fostered solidarity as they moved forward towards the end of their online learning experience.
Explaining Change Laboratory to research funding and ethical review panels: Examples from studies in palliative care and healthcare
This is a collection of ‘starter documents’ that I hope will be useful to others as they navigate funding and ethical review processes for studies that seek to draw on Activity Theory and Change Laboratory approaches. The documents are drawn from two different research studies: in both cases working up the content helped me to create a framework to (a) help people unfamiliar with Activity Theory understand the principles of the work and (b) provide me with ‘scaffolding’ for putting the theory into practical actions. They are not intended to be taken as the ‘right’ way to go about all research projects – rather to provide examples to help others think through where to start, particularly if new to using these methodologies and methods, after all it is often easier to react to something than be faced with a blank sheet from which to begin. There is some repetition between documents as I was required to present the information in different formats for different groups and purposes as noted in the document list below.
Creating participant workbooks for double-stimulation tasks
This technical report sets out an example of a participant workbook, considering how a particular workbook was created and used in online workshop tasks. The idea is that, as researcher-interventionists, we can design and distribute provisions for participants in workbooks, through which they can maintain their own archive of ideas, reflections, and expansive progress. The workbook provides graphical and textual stimuli for double-stimulation tasks; annotations and illustrations arising from encounters with mirror data; and observations of their own daily reality and related disturbances. The design aims to support participants to record, archive, and retrieve their thoughts and acts in agentive ways concomitant with the Change Laboratory approach. The resources described have proven useful in online Change Laboratory projects, whose contexts are briefly described.
An indicative structure for planning and coordinating workshops across a Change Laboratory research-intervention
This technical report sets out a series of tools which I hope will be useful in structuring, planning, and coordinating expansive workshops across a Change Laboratory research-intervention. By definition, a Change Laboratory research-intervention ought to empower participants to expansively identify, expose, and aggravate contradictions in their social activity of work and learning: we therefore plan, all the while hoping that we will engender expansivity to the point where our plans will be rejected. A structure for our research-intervention’s workshops deserves careful organisation yet inherent flexibility, allowing us to prepare for participants’ progressively expansive work, to organise and coordinate double stimulation tasks, to predict and trace the engendering of their transformative agency. The structure described below has provided such a handrail and segue, for both participants and for myself as a researcher-interventionist: assisting in the preparation and mediation of double stimulation tasks; provoking and tracing agentive and expansive social interactions; and providing arrangements for data curation, reflection, and reflexivity.
Copyright (c) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
A OneNote template for knowledge management across a Change Laboratory project
This short report describes an approach to managing information and knowledge in a Change Laboratory project using a Microsoft OneNote template. The resource was developed for a project which took place at a federal university in the United Arab Emirates and involved teachers on a laptop-mediated preparatory English language course. The researcher-interventionist was concerned about how data generated during the project could be managed in terms of presentation, interaction with participants and storage and tracking as the intervention progressed. The solution was to use a Microsoft OneNote template to manage presentation of mirror data, provide the work surfaces for participants during the sessions, and also to serve as a record or repository of the Change Laboratory as it took place. The template proved to be a very useful tool and greatly facilitated this particular project. The author feels that the template would also be of use to other researcher-interventionists with access to the same technological tools.
Project management of an online Change Laboratory using Notion
In this resource I present a tool called Notion which I used to project manage an online Change Laboratory (CL) project that lasted 4 months and where participants were from two organisations, a university computing department and a secondary school. The key aims behind what I was trying to accomplish with Notion was to keep all CL resources together in one location and to allow people to access those resources throughout the CL process. In subsequent sections of this document, I give a brief overview of this Change Laboratory, my needs when choosing a platform to manage this project, an overview of Notion, followed by practical examples of how I used it. I conclude with a link for readers to access a demonstration site.