Hi Sylvia,
I understand that everybody has an opinion, and I respect yours as a
subject of discussion. However, there are certain things that make me
wander what is the difference between teaching design and teaching general
education courses. I will express certain disagreement with some of your
positions, as well as my support for others. My responses follow closely
the order of your statements.
1. I believe that the core of design curriculum is the studio. (This issue
is important enough to become another tread.)
2. The rest of the courses I would call "informational" or as you call
them, "contextual". The informational courses provide disciplinary
information that is necessary for understanding, conceptualizing and
developing the project. When we engage in problem solving, we need
particular knowledge basis, a vocabulary of concepts that feed into the
complex process of creating the solution. The studio is the arena for
integration. It is also the best training ground for problem solving/designing.
3. We should teach students to develop reflexive attitude and analyze what
they are doing. Although this might not be a must for an artist, it is a
good approach. And if students do not learn to be reflective and analytical
in academia, they would not master these skills after they get into the
pragmatic and mundane world of the design firm. The reflective practitioner
is created in academe.
4. I can agree with you that the studio as a teaching methodology needs to
be revisited once in a while and aligned to the new realities. That is
actually true for every other teaching methodology.
5. If design students are scared in/by studio, this is an indication that
they are not mature for this educational major. My position is that if
medicine and law are taught in graduate school, the same should apply to
design. Design is not easier than rocket science and we should not
devaluate our profession and ourselves. Students need to mature before they
go in design. If they go in this major because it is fun and is easy, it
becomes a kindergarten. We can't procure intelligent discourse and the
level of communication falls down to class management. That's why I was
talking about babysitting. I didn't mean to offend the honorable men and
women who spend their lives for the future of the human kind.
Still in this line of thought, I don't remember a single classmate of mine
being scared in/by studio. It was the greatest pleasure, it was the meaning
of our lives. There was a lot of pain, but not scare. The pain came not
from the offenses of a rude instructor, but from the failure to meet our
own standards and aspirations. For the real artist, there is nothing more
painful than not being able to meet his/her own goals. Of course, this was
quite a long time ago and now the Gen-x-ers have very different world view
and reactions.
6. You said: I sometimes say to the students : "I am as lost as you are.
The only difference is that I am less afraid of it." I am sorry, but I
don't find this serious. I would not like that the frustrated design
ambitions are conceptualized as "scare." Don't be scared like your
students. I bet you know enough to see at least three steps ahead of them.
Like any good designer, you can see forward much further than the novices
and you can see much more options and alternatives. That's what you need to
teach them -- to look forward and see many possibilities. I can understand
that there will be confusion with multiple possibilities, frustration over
the best selection, and lack of vision forward, but this should not lead to
scare. Frustration is much more correct descriptor and it is normal to be
frustrated. Students need to develop tolerance to ambiguity and
frustration. They need to know that this happens to everyone in the
creative process. Still, scare is a different emotion.
7. It is good that you are not satisfied with the linearity of
question-answer dichotomy. However, good design instructors never resort
to it. They operate in cycles of "problem-multiple
solutions-evaluation/selection." This is one of the basic structures of the
design process.
8. I agree with you that we have to envisage in our teaching a time line
which is 15-20 years ahead. It is not that difficult. What is a major
revolution today might become a everyday triviality after 20 years. The art
of design is to feel the zeitgeist as well to have an intuition about which
trends will live to mature and which will die before even getting in the
professional journals. These are qualities that have to be developed in the
studio.
I am open for discussions. I hope this time nobody will jump up when you
read this text. I was dismayed by the way my previous post was interpreted.
It was in defence of the talented designer who functions as an analytical
and articulate studio instructor. Too many people got distracted by several
buzz words and jokes and banked over secondary issues.
Regards,
Lubomir Popov
At 08:24 PM 6/24/2003 +0200, Sylvia GHIBAUDO wrote:
>Dear all,
>
>The new contributions to the debate make me think of a number of things.
>
>The first one is an impression that comes from the reading of most (not
>all) contributions :
>1/ We seem to consider that studio teaching is at the core of design
>teaching (My first reaction was implicitely making the same assumption);
>and as a consequence,
>2/ That teaching is not a collective activity, in other words, that design
>is, in essence, what is taught by designers, the rest of the (compulsory)
>courses being contextual, rather then substantial to the discipline. Not
>to mention the contribution of the students (as individuals, but also as a
>group).
>
>Both points are, to me, puzzling, and I try to find hints about possible
>responses by confronting them to my experience (with the inherent limits
>of such approach).
>
>Mattias wrapped all contributions nicely, and then wrote :
>"Now, there are even more meta-levels above the first one. This is when you
>take a step back from the design artifact to reflect upon and assess the
>process of design. What are the techniques, tools, and methods used in the
>process, and how can they be used differently and to the best? Should one
>use a completely different technique to, for example, externalise and
>diverge thoughts on situation of use?"
>
>I am not sure that I really agree. I feel that we cannot really put
>students in a situation of "deconstruction" of a practice they haven't
>internalized. And hoping that the "other" courses (typically lectures, as
>far as I know) will allow these meta levels to become operative is maybe
>slightly optimistic. If deconstruction is a key word, then the studio
>teaching itself ought to be deconstructed/reconstructed, if not
>permanently, at least often. And probably the school also.
>
>I often try to have an "ethnographical" approach to (my) teaching moments.
>One thing that struck me was that most design students are more scared by
>having no answer to propose, rather then by challenging the subject
>itself. And in my view, the most open subjects do not request an answer,
>they request that you develop a position, and articulate it. I mean here
>that there is a sort of "dictatorship" of linearity (question>answer, that
>I prefer to replace by : situation/position) which, I think, produces
>often boring results. I sometimes say to the students : "I am as lost as
>you are. The only difference is that I am less afraid of it."
>
>One of the questions I ask myself every now and then is "what should we
>expose the students to" so that they are equipped for proposing visions to
>the world in which they will be "blossoming", say in 15 years. I believe
>that there are substantial changes in the concepts of body, time and/or
>space, and that very little is done to project/articulate teaching along
>these open lines.
>
>Best regards
>
>Jean
>
>
>
> > Message du 24/06/03 17:50
> > De : Tim Smithers <[log in to unmask]>
> > A : [log in to unmask]
> > Copie ŕ :
> > Objet : Re: Good Designer=Good Design Teacher? ...
> > Hello,
> >
> > In the context of the Good Designer = Good Design
> > Teacher discussion, I thought I'd mention a recent
> > paper that I think is quit relevant and informative.
> >
> > It's
> >
> > Designing and learning: a disjunction in contexts
> > by L L Bucciarelli, School of Engineering, MIT,
> > in Design Studies, Vol 24, no 3, may 2003,
> > pp 295--311.
> >
> > I expect that many of you already know this paper,
> > but for those who haven't seen it, here is the
> > abstract:
> >
> > Two ideologies about engineering, one claimed the
> > habit of engineering design practitioners, the
> > other that of engineering educators, are advanced.
> > The two are incompatible. The disjunction is
> > elaborated in terms of two distinct postulates
> > and their consequences. A remedy for educators
> > is recommended and the experiences of the author
> > in attempting to change the context of learning
> > to better accord with engineering practice are
> > described.
> >
> > The two postulates are, and these, I think, are very
> > nice:
> >
> > 1) Engineering design
> >
> > Engineering design is a social process requiring
> > the participation of different individuals having
> > different competencies, responsibilities, and
> > technical interests. Each participant sees the
> > object of design differently, in accord with the
> > paradigmatic core of their discipline, and their
> > position of responsibility.
> >
> > 2) Engineering education
> >
> > Engineering is an instrumental process requiring
> > the application of established, rational scientific
> > theory in the development of new products and
> > systems for the benefit of humankind. Different
> > engineering disciplines rest upon different
> > paradigmatic sciences.
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > Tim Smithers
> > Donostia / San Sebastián
> >
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