In this blog we hear from Dave Darch and Francesca Gkotsi from A Little Learning, an arts and technology service provider to schools, about how they use Digital Audio Workstations (DAWs) to support Arts Award. If you are running a music-based Arts Award programme this blog will give you lots of ideas for how you could extend your practice and incorporate DAWs into your delivery.
At A Little Learning, creative technology is part of everyday practice. We work alongside schools, using arts and digital tools to give young people time to explore ideas, take creative risks, and build confidence through making. We have been delivering Arts Award for over 15 years.
Music-making is a big part of this work, and we regularly use digital audio workstations (DAWs) with children and young people. DAWs are software tools used to create, record and edit music. In schools, this might mean working in GarageBand, BandLab, Soundtrap, YuStudio, Ableton, Logic, Cubase or another platform that’s already available.
We don’t focus too much on the platform itself. There’s no single “right” DAW, and you don’t need a recording studio, specialist equipment or expensive kit. When it comes to choosing a DAW, we usually start with what’s already on the devices in front of us. If young people can make music, save their work, and export it, the software is doing its job. What matters more is what young people can do with the tools they have: making choices, trying ideas out, changing their minds, and listening back to what they’ve created. All of this fits naturally with Arts Award’s flexible ethos, whatever level young people are working at.
When we’re delivering Arts Award, DAWs give young people a straightforward way to start making music. We often see them begin by experimenting with sounds, loops or short recordings, and then slowly shape these into something more finished. Being able to see a timeline fill up as a track develops can really help make the creative process visible.
When we work with young people who are new to music-making, we usually scaffold their starting points. This might mean selecting the scales they can use or pre-setting chords. Doing this removes barriers caused by a lack of musical experience and allows them to focus on expression, texture, and structure. The result is often music that sounds confident and feels complete, which can be a real boost early on. As confidence grows, we loosen those supports and give young people more freedom to make their own musical decisions.
At the same time, DAWs offer plenty of room for more confident music-makers to stretch. We often see young people refining arrangements, building sections more deliberately, layering parts, experimenting with effects, and revisiting earlier decisions to improve their work. Sometimes this takes a few attempts — that’s part of the process.
Activities are kept open-ended. Sometimes young people start from the same short loop and take it in different directions. Other times, they build a piece around a place or environment, collecting sounds and arranging them into a short composition. We also spend time rearranging sections of a track to explore how structure changes the feel of a piece. These approaches work across ages and levels and support both experimentation and reflection.
The great thing about DAWs is that they can easily be used for evidencing. They’re designed to export work, which makes capturing evidence fairly straightforward. Young people can export audio files, take screenshots of project timelines, and include short notes or recordings explaining what they’ve done.
As young people work, they’re already creating material that shows their progress. Saving an early version of a track and then comparing it to a later one can demonstrate skill development and artistic progression. Screenshots of timelines at various stages of production show, at a glance, how a piece has grown and changed over time.
Reflection doesn’t need to be complicated. Some young people write a few sentences about what they tried and what changed. Others prefer to record a short voice note while listening back to their work, explaining one thing they learned. These spoken reflections are often quick and personal.
DAWs also support collaboration. Young people can share files, work on projects together, listen to each other’s work, and give feedback. Those conversations often become part of the learning and can be captured as evidence, too.
DAWs are also useful when Arts Award activities involve watching or listening to performances. After seeing a concert, gig, or livestream, young people might record an audio response instead of writing a review. This often feels more immediate and less formal, especially for learners who find writing difficult.
Some young people even choose to respond creatively by making a short piece of music that reflects the mood or feeling of what they experienced. Talking through why they chose certain sounds helps them connect creative decisions with their response.
When young people research artists or producers, DAWs give them a way to log that research through sound. This might include recording a recreated section, experimenting with a particular technique, or adding a spoken explanation of what they’ve discovered. Trying ideas out, rather than just capturing what they found out, tends to make research feel more meaningful and relevant to their own practice — particularly at the higher levels of Arts Award.
We also use DAWs when young people are sharing skills with others and developing their arts leadership skills. This might be showing someone how they built a beat, recorded vocals or organised a project, or creating a starter file for someone else to develop. Often, these moments are quite informal, but they’re still powerful.
When we run Arts Award, one of the things we focus on is keeping things meaningful and manageable. DAWs help by keeping creative work and evidence in one place. A small number of audio files, screenshots and short reflections is usually enough to show progress clearly.
Used in this way, DAWs fit naturally into Arts Award delivery across different levels. They support creativity, reflection and confidence-building, without adding extra layers of work for young people or staff.
For more information about A Little Learning, or if you are interested in finding out about A Little Learning's range of CPD sessions on digital creativity from music production to creative code to animation, please email Frankie or Dave at info@alittlelearning.org