Include 2011 : The role of inclusive design in making social innovation happen.

Include is the biennial conference held at the RCA and hosted by the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design. The event is directed by Jo-Anne Bichard and attracts an international delegation

The concept of learning goals will always be in my head"-Aligning and Applying Learning Goals in Participatory Design in a School Context

In this paper, we explore applying learning goals in participatory design (PD) practice as an approach to mutual learning in a school context. The paper is based on experiences from master students in interaction design, who were instructed to define learning goals for children participating in PD activities that they organized in a school context. Based on the results of this study, we suggest a number of strategies for aligning and applying learning goals in PD in school contexts in practice: Debrief the results from the children\u27s reflections with the teachers, Scalability in regard to time and context, Adjust to age, Collaborate with the teacher to define specific learning goals, Formulate learning gains for the teachers, and Develop support materials

What lessons can be transferred to higher education learning landscapes from the leadership, governance and management processes of school design projects?

This review reports experiences from the schools sector in involving stakeholders in the processes of managing school building design. Its aim was to see if any of this could offer guidance for higher education as their learning landscapes are reconceptualised. School architects and designers have gradually accepted grater stakeholder involvement especially from pupils and to a lesser extent from teachers and many innovative ways have been found to make their participation authentic. These could be adapted in higher education together with teacher education in new pedagogies and better liaison with governors

Towards an interdisciplinary model of practice for participatory building design in education

It is recognised that educational environments influence learning experiences, so it is important to ensure that educational buildings are designed to be fit for purpose. In order to ensure that educational buildings meet the needs of those who use them, all relevant stakeholders should be involved in the design process. However, this is not straightforward and much remains unclear about how involvement in such complex design processes should proceed. This article presents the findings of four small heterogeneous groups of architects, educational designers, teachers and students from the UK and The Netherlands, discussing how they would envision optimal collaboration and involvement of stakeholders in the process of (re)designing educational buildings and instructional methods. Presentations from the four groups were transcribed and analysed. Informed by a review of existing models and frameworks, our findings were synthesised into a new interdisciplinary model of participatory building design in education. This new model focuses on an iterative design process with different stakeholders involved in different ways at different times. We propose that this model can inform policy and practice in educational building design, as well as within co-creation of curricula, learning, teaching and assessment

Culture-based artefacts to inform ICT design: foundations and practice

Cultural aspects frame our perception of the world and direct the many different ways people interact with things in it. For this reason, these aspects should be considered when designing technology with the purpose to positively impact people in a community. In this paper, we revisit the foundations of culture aiming to bring this concept in dialogue with design. To inform design with cultural aspects, we model reality in three levels of formality: informal, formal, and technical, and subscribe to a systemic vision that considers the technical solution as part of a more complex social system in which people live and interact. In this paper, we instantiate this theoretical and methodological view by presenting two case studies of technology design in which culture-based artefacts were employed to inform the design process. We claim that as important as including issues related to culture in the ICT design agenda—from the conception to the development, evaluation, and adoption of a technology—is the need to support the design process with adequate artefacts that help identifying cultural aspects within communities and translating them into sociotechnical requirements. We argue that a culturally informed perspective on design can go beyond an informative analysis, and can be integrated with the theoretical and methodological framework used to support design, throughout the entire design process

Communication and Non-Speaking Children with Physical Disabilities: Opportunities and Reflections from Design-Oriented Research

This thesis presents a series of design-oriented studies for investigating and describing communication involving children with severe speech and physical impairments (SSPIs). The overarching goal is to inform how designers conceptualise communication that involves children with SSPIs beyond a widely cited view that communication centres around speech and happens at the level of the individual through the transmission of information. Instead, by positioning communication as co-constructed, situated and multimodal, the goal is to stimulate how one designs for digitally mediated communication by applying multiple, alternative frames that acknowledge these features. In order to achieve this goal, qualitative empirical fieldwork is undertaken that examines the everyday communication experiences of five children who have SSPIs. Drawing on theoretical influences from multimodal social semiotics and participatory design, study one and two investigate child centred accounts of communication involving children with SSPIs and their peers. The focus is on investigating communication, first in formal learning contexts involving existing augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) technologies, then in broader contexts beyond AAC use. Multi-layered perspectives are generated that consider: 1. a child’s view, by attending to children’s values and choices of modes; 2. an interactional view that attends to how communication is co-constructed in situ with other people and material objects, and; 3. a structural view, that examines the orderings of people, material objects and activities within an environment. These layered understandings produce research frames that are then utilised in study three. A design documentary is created and used to motivate design work for supporting face to face communication involving children with SSPIs and their peers with a team of designers who do not hold fixed orientations to designing assistive technologies. The findings of the three studies make three new contributions to the fields of HCI and AAC. First, the findings produce a theoretical perspective on communication, acknowledging multiple modes and displacing the taken for granted centrality of language. Second, the findings reveal design opportunities for new and existing technologies. Third, the studies contribute methodological insights for design work by considering ways of involving both children and designers when designing with and for children with SSPIs

Investigating opportunities for Service Design in Education for Sustainable Development

This research investigates opportunities for Service Design in Education. The focus is on a particular type of change happening within education that of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) where Service Design has little presence and limited knowledge. This research has been carried out through grounded theory and contextualised in English institutions of primary education. As a result it identified Service Design as an approach to enable transformational change within educational institutions that seek to move towards ESD. To establish the basis for the research, a literature review has been carried out on Service Design, the vision of ESD and its application in the context of English schools. As a result, Service Design capability to re-design services at organisational level was linked to the gap in normative re-educative change processes towards ESD in English schools. The rest of the research sought to build on these findings. In-depth case studies with five primary schools and a cross-case analysis have been carried out to establish an understanding of ESD change at organisational level. It focused on elements relevant to normative re-educative change processes, which included social and personal norms and values residing within organisational systems. From the case studies, principles, concepts and processes were identified that enabled schools to engage with ESD at the deepest level. The knowledge derived from the case studies was further developed in order to relate the ESD phenomenon to Service Design. Service thinking and organisational change theory were applied to develop a Sustainable Education as a Service Model (SES MODEL) to understand ESD as a phenomenon in a service system. A SES Model was presented back to Service Design community. The sense-making of ESD was undertaken with seven service design practitioners by conducting semi-structured interviews during which they explored the SES Model. The outcome of the interviews showed the model to build service designer s capacity to engage with ESD, while the use of the model showed that designers could envision using it at a normative re-educative change level. The research shows that ESD is a new concept, which is relevant to Service Design. It therefore offers opportunities for further service design research and practical applications

ArtWorks Evaluation Final Report

This summary provides an overview of the Final Evaluation Report for the Paul Hamlyn Foundation's (PHF) Special Initiative, ArtWorks. The Evaluation has been undertaken by DHA and the Institute for Cultural Practices, University of Manchester