Skip to content


infed.org

exploring education, pedagogy and community action

explore

explore

  • new and recommended
  • arenas
  • ideas
  • thinkers
  • walks
  • index
  • archives: the full collection

browse our categories

Removing some categories by Tom Natt. Sourced from Flickr and reproduced under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0) licence.
 
Click on a category and all the articles within it will be displayed.

Archives

Association, democracy and civil society

Christian youth work and youth ministry

Community

Community learning and development

Community studies

Crime and justice

Ecology

Education

Enterprise

Evaluation

Group work

Helping, casework and counselling

Ideas

Informal and non-formal education

Informal Jewish education

Learning

Lifelong learning and adult education

Organizational learning

Outdoor experience

Playwork

Reflective practice

Research for practice

Schooling

Social action, social change and social reform

Social and university settlements

Social pedagogy

Social work

Teaching and pedagogy

Thinkers and innovators

What is… ?

Youth work

Picture: Removing some categories by Tom Natt. Sourced from Flickr and reproduced under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0) licence. https://www.flickr.com/photos/tomnatt/3337957009

updated: June 20, 2019

new +
updated

What is informal education? This piece explores its nature, practice and purpose. [Updated April 2026]

Creators not Consumers. Rediscovering social education. Written by Mark Smith, Creators not Consumers first appeared in 1980. We reproduce the complete text from the 1982 edition. It is now available in various formats.
[March 2026]

Josephine Klein, group work, youth work and exploring English cultures. Don Macdonald reflects on the extraordinary contribution she made. [First published February 2026].

A brief history of Burray and South Ronaldsay (1477 to 1799). Explore the first 300 years of Scotland's control of the Orkney Islands (where infed.org is based). [Published February 2026].

Maude Stanley, girls’ clubs and district visiting. One of the central pioneers of girls’ work and neighbourhood work in general. [Updated January 2026].

Walking informal education – exploring developments in central London. [Updated January 2026].





infed.org

infed.org (the encyclopaedia of pedagogy and informal education) is not-for-profit and cookie-free. It began in 1996 and is currently visited around two million times a year.
We explore informal education and pedagogy in the context of schooling, work with children and young people, community learning and development, and lifelong learning.
Most pages are copyrighted. The copyright notice below relates to material in this and the adjacent footer sections. It also applies to each link below.

For more details, go to: about us • privacy • write for us • design • copyright • disclaimer

contact us

about us

infed.org is edited by Mark K Smith with help from Tony Jeffs. It has been based in South Ronaldsay (Orkney) since 2019.

Photograph: the south of the island - Rob Farrow | Wikimedia ccbyaas2.

featured this month

Henrietta Barnett, social reform and community building. Henrietta Barnett (1851-1936) is known for the creation of Hampstead Garden Suburb, but she, with Samuel Barnett, was an important social reformer. One notable innovation was the university settlement, but they were also active in other arenas.

© 2026 infed.org • Built with GeneratePress