8 to 11 year olds

“Thank you so much for all the friendly and enthusiastic support you have given (our daughter) as she’s developed her photography skills – we were so very lucky to find The Mango Lab!” LW, Teens Beginners & Advanced Photography course

Junior Future Creatives

Our Junior Future Creatives program has grown over a decade. Head of Child and Teen Education Creative Director, Julia Massey Stewart, is very intent on making certain your children and teens are guided by one amazing principle of our governing philosophy – learning is fun! We often receive comments from parents saying that their son or daughter’s course time is the highlight of their week. That’s pretty cool feedback and fabulous to hear!

All our tutors are Enhanced DBS certified and our non-discriminatory teaching methods are completely focused on your child’s successful learning path. Additionally, as members of the International Visual Literacy Association (IVLA), our unique offering is that in addition to the practical experience of using cameras, lenses and computers we will encourage your son or daughter to engage in a process involving how they see, observe, makes decisions and communicate. Once again, our Parent and Student Feedback page is testament to the commitment we make to your child learning and growing.

As with all our courses across the age groups, and in particular with our youngest ages of students, we work and observe together as a group and vary the pace and activities – not walking or sitting for too long, with mini breaks and lots of variety! Almost always our lovely students don’t want to stop and want to come back for more. We have tested our course times over many years now – we set up The Mango Lab in 2009! So we are confident these time slots for this younger age group are tried and tested and work.
We also loan cameras of size and weight appropriate for the student, so please guide us when/if reserving a FREE LOAN CAMERA for your child for one of our courses.
We look forward to inspiring you soon!

PHOTOGRAPHY + CAMERA BASICS
Light, Camera, Action! | building awareness and confidence to create vision

The fun begins at learning how to make images. Automation in mobile phones makes everyone a budding photographer – that’s the elephant in the room. Our students want more than a point and shoot experience and we deliver that. How do I photograph my dog in the dark? Why are my pictures not sharp? Do you think this is a good picture? In Photography + Camera Skills we move away from automation and into thinking individually about making a photograph. Your child discovers the science behind the camera and light in a series of experiments through which the fundamentals of photography are revealed.

MAKING STORIES THROUGH VISUAL LITERACY
Telling Stories with Pictures | reading images and building camera skills

From fake news to infographics, staged Instagram selfies to viral images of lawyers with cat avatars our children are growing up in an environment where the image continues to creep into our information forming networks. Understanding how reading images can affect how we feel or interpret society around us is a necessary part of our information gathering process. Moving from a text literate to a visual literate society is the next iteration in expanding our growth as communicators. Our brand of visual literacy courses for junior creatives simply explores the act of seeing. Unlike the photography courses this is about deep seeing into photographs already made. Through games, puzzles and reading picture practice the course intends to have 8 – 11 year olds observe, feedback and expand on visuals placed in front of them in order to improve on observational and image reading skills and bring to their attention the influencing factors pictures can make.

COURSES in 2026
Saturdays term-time 2026: Feb 28 / March 7, 21, 28 / April 18 only / May 2, 16 / June 13, 20, July 4.
Easter holidays 2026: TUES 7 – FRI 10 April (avoiding Easter Bank Holiday Monday), and Mon 13 – Thurs 16 April.
May Half-term holidays 2026: Mon 25 – Thurs 28 May
Summer holidays 2026: July – August
Autumn term-time 2026
October half-term 2026

Holiday courses start and finish at our meeting space in Chancery Lane for the time being, whilst we await completion of renovations in Covent Garden, London, unless otherwise advised.
Weekend courses: various central London locations and to be advised before each course.
For Cornwall courses please see the Cornwall section below.
We include elements of Camera Basics and Making Stories as highlighted above, with flexiblity to adjust to the group’s interests.

SATURDAYS TERM-TIME SPRING and SUMMER 2026 | LONDON

SATURDAY term-time courses: click month tab to view dates and booking buttons.

MAY

JUNE

JULY

Saturday, 2 May, 2026 – one session (you can add more dates to suit you)
10am-1pm, MORNINGS, 3 hours. Max. 6 students per group. £89 inc. VAT, free camera loan, lens loan, tripods, software, if applicable for this week. 3 hours total.

8 to 11 year olds

“Thank you so much for all the friendly and enthusiastic support you have given (our daughter) as she’s developed her photography skills – we were so very lucky to find The Mango Lab!” LW, Teens Beginners & Advanced Photography course

Junior Future Creatives

PHOTOGRAPHY + CAMERA BASICSLight, Camera, Action! | building awareness and confidence to create vision

MAKING STORIES THROUGH VISUAL LITERACYTelling Stories with Pictures | reading images and building camera skills

MAY HALF-TERM HOLIDAYS

SUMMER HOLIDAYS 2026LONDON COURSES for CHILDREN: 8-11 year olds (and a bit either side)

ONLINE sessions: via Zoom /Teams, 1:1BEGINNERS Photography and Camera skills – customisable, just tell us what you want to learn!

Beginners Plus / Intermediate – all customisable to what you want to learn

PHOTOGRAPHY + CAMERA BASICS
Light, Camera, Action! | building awareness and confidence to create vision

MAKING STORIES THROUGH VISUAL LITERACY
Telling Stories with Pictures | reading images and building camera skills

SUMMER HOLIDAYS 2026
LONDON COURSES for CHILDREN: 8-11 year olds (and a bit either side)

ONLINE sessions: via Zoom /Teams, 1:1

BEGINNERS Photography and Camera skills – customisable, just tell us what you want to learn!