Hi Mike,
I seem to remember that 'well-structured' and 'ill-structured' came
originally from maths and were adopted in early engineering design theory
(probably from about 1955 with the enthusiasm for engineering design
research - see the Grinter Committee report). The terminology was around
in engineering design in the 60s and early 70s. Mathematicians attracted to
architectural design such as Chris Alexander, would have been aware of the
terminology.
Best regards,
Terry
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-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Mike
McAuley
Sent: Monday, 21 April 2008 9:35 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: well-structured and ill-structured activity in designing
Dear list members,
I am nearing the end of a study which incorporated two separate learning
strategies designed to assist novice students interpret written text into
illustrations. The first strategy involved comprehension and the second was
based on analogical reasoning.
Without going into details, one of the conclusions I am formulating is that
designing is far from being an exclusively ill-structured activity. Within
the process model of problem-analysis-synthesis-
execution-production-evaluation, I have found that, at the early stage of
problem definition and analysis students can benefit from a well-structured
approach to certain aspects of the problem. In my enquiry this related to
determining macrostructures (the gist) within the text (Louwerse and
Graesser, 2006). Can anyone tell me who originated the terms ill-structured
and well-structured? Has anyone else come to the conclusion that designing
isn't exclusively an ill- structured activity?
Mike McAuley
PhD candidate
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