On Wednesday, February 26, 2003, at 08:42 AM, Chris RUST(SCS) wrote:
"Of course there is a role for deconstructing your ideas and carrying
out discrete experiments to work out specific problems within the
design, but that has to take place against the background of a holistic
understanding of the whole problem.
And the ideas of "problem solving" and "artistic" (or "aesthetic")
creativity seem to provide no space for the kind of synthesis that
designers increasingly are expected to engage in, which sometimes feels
more like social invention than anything else".
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Dear Chris,
I couldn't agree with you more. If one was only to give students the
two part approach I mentioned, then that would end in disaster.
The example I gave was from an 8 week course dealing with "idea
generation and design process". The two part task is given after there
has been a lot of discussion and work on the concept of design process
and, as you point out, generating an understanding of the holistic
nature of this process and the need to be able to make a synthesis of
the various inputs.
I did mention later in my post:
" These two areas of the task have to be woven together further down
the line".
You hit on an interesting point though in your post. When teaching
design students, to what extent should one regard them as
mini-designers, where they should do things as one would in a
professional situation or whether one as design coach should take into
account that they are in a learning situation and give them the means
to understand, notice and articulate where they are going wrong in
their thinking and approach.
This was the motivation for the example I gave. I am very fond of the
coaching approach that gives the students a framework that helps them
see what they are doing wrong and then having identified and
articulated the problem, they then carry out in your words "discrete
experiments to work out specific problems within the design". I would
like to add - and to work out specific problems within their design
thinking.
It is incredibly important, in my mind, to give the students these "off
the loop" possibilities. I have too often seen students whose only
knowledge of design is by taking one project after the other down the
line and who feel that as long as they are acting as "they think" one
should as a professional designer, then they are doing ok. Their
projects might look cool and appear to function, but their
understanding of their thinking and, in the context of the post I sent,
their understanding of their creativity is singularly lacking.
You write:
"seem to provide no space for the kind of synthesis that designers
increasingly
are expected to engage in, which sometimes feels more like social
invention
than anything else."
I know from experience that the concept behind the coaching example I
gave can be used in other types of design tasks. I have some projects
dealing with pervasive computing and immaterial design / system design.
It is still advantageous, in getting the students to understand their
thinking and approach to a design process, to have an off the loop task
and encourage the students to deconstruct their process into various
parts, so that they can identify, what they often take for granted. The
students are doing a lot more thinking than they realise. Their lack of
appreciation of this leads to much stress because they are unaware as
to what they have to organise within themselves. It's difficult to
organise or relate to that which is tacit.
I think the underlying question, with regard to your post is how should
we research into and structure a new approach for design programs that
deal with the complexities of modern design tasks? This is certainly my
aim.
Thanks for your response.
Best regards,
Chris.
-------------
from:
Chris Heape
Senior Researcher - Design Didactics / Design Practice
Mads Clausen Institute
University of Southern Denmark
Sønderborg
Denmark
http://www.mci.sdu.dk
Work:
tel: +45 6550 1671
e.mail: chris @mci.sdu.dk
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