The development of a design thinking course for distance learning

Nicole Schadewitz, Peter Lloyd, Steve Garner, Georgy Holden and Emma Dewberry 

To participate in this blog go to: designthinking.typepad.com/dialogues/  

The panelists are involved in the production of a new distance education course at the Open University titled Design Thinking. They will focus on three related questions:  

What is ‘design thinking’?    

http://designthinking.typepad.com/dialogues/1-what-is-design-thinking.html

Is it possible to develop the skills and knowledge of design thinking through distance learning and, if so, what should the student experience involve?  

http://designthinking.typepad.com/dialogues/2-design-thinking-skills.html 

Can design-a subject with a strong peer-oriented, studio-based interactive education history-be taught and learned through a distance learning environment?

http://designthinking.typepad.com/dialogues/3-design-thinking-distance.html

Objectives for this discussion:

To review the possibility of developing design thinking skills building on non-linear and individual learning routes, which would also ideally address individual learning preferences and styles. Due to professional experience and education some learning styles might be more developed than others.  

To discuss the value of integrating community learning and sharing of individual learning processes via online message boards. The use of synchronous and asynchronous communication among peers and tutors might be incorporated into design assignments developed by the course development team.    

To address the possibility and viability of a global collaborative design studio project into the Design Thinking course. It is debatable if international design collaboration should be part of an introductory design thinking course that tries to tackle the complexity of global design thinking processes. One major question to address would be how it could be incorporated and facilitated.    

To discuss the long-term goals of this course. For example, global collaboration could be incorporated when this course is adopted by other OU’s around the world.   

The Open University, UK was established in 1969 to promote and develop distance learning for a diverse population of students who cannot commit to full time study. The Open University offers a unique structure to teaching and learning. Students receive course material that they study and discuss with their local tutors, small teams, face-to-face, via telephone or in online discussion forums.

The Design group at the Open University offers several short (100 hour) and full credit (600 hour) courses, including a second level course: Design and Designing and a third level course: Innovation: Designing for a Sustainable Future. Together the courses lead to a Diploma in Design (Holden & Garner 2005; Garner, 2005). The development of a new first level 600-hour course in Design Thinking (U101) will eventually lead to a degree award in design. Such an award opens up the opportunity to improve learners' engagement and experiences in distributed design education.

Second and third level courses consist of printed course materials supplemented with interactive and pre-recorded course elements distributed on DVD and a course web site. The material is mainly studied linearly, with the exception of supplementary worksheets that focus on the development of students' practical design skills in parallel to the main course text.

The course production teams' efforts for the new first level Design Thinking course concentrate on the exploitation and further development of the University's Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) to support a non-linear learning experience where learners not only learn about design but create and co-create design artefacts both individually and with fellow students. 

The panel will be composed of members of the course production team, who will discuss the opportunities and challenges in the development of the new Design Thinking course for distributed design learning.

The discussion will be centered around an existing blog that is used by the course production team to share thoughts, references, examples, and keep track of the development process. With this we hope to spark a public discussion on the challenges of distance design education.  

The questions the panel wishes to address are central to the development of the new Design Thinking course. Such a course is seen as an original attempt to offer new ways of engaging with design education across geographical and professional boundaries.

1. What is ‘design thinking’?

http://designthinking.typepad.com/dialogues/1-what-is-design-thinking.html

The first topic in this panel discussion will address the fundamental question of whether or not design thinking is a distinctively different form of thinking and if so how it differs from other thinking styles. Cross (2006) proposed that there are specific “designerly” ways of knowing and thinking including synthesis, empathy and concern for appropriateness. Designers think constructively. Hence, in order to establish a common ground for a discussion around the topic of design thinking in distance education, panelists will discuss the knowledge base of design thinking first. Thereafter, participants will engage with the question of how this knowledge might evolve through distance education outside of professional, collocated design practice. This leads to the second topic that will be discussed in this panel: 

2. Is it possible to develop the skills and knowledge of design thinking through distance learning and, if so, what should the student experience involve?

http://designthinking.typepad.com/dialogues/2-design-thinking-skills.html

In the traditional undergraduate design studio, students experience a range of learning opportunities. These include formal and informal peer discussion and review, tutor-led one-on-one dialogues and feedback, 2D and 3D skills teaching, group teaching and discussion, both individual and group critical review and, probably one of the most important elements in building up comprehensive design literacy, the opportunity for collegiate discussion, exploration and feedback: the building of a ‘community of practice.’ The studio is the nearest thing in design education to emulate a sense of professional design practice and as such forms a valuable part in informing a designer’s training, thinking and way of perceiving the world. In many distance learning environments, course materials and students‘ interaction with materials and others (peers or tutors) is highly structured and often linearly studied. In many ways, the development of design thinking skills contradicts with such linear model of learning. Can the learning foci thus far described be encapsulated in a distance learning relationship between both student and tutor and between student and student? How can such activity successfully be drawn out through an on-line learning environment? The discussion can make reference to some related issues like understanding how existing expertise at the Open University for developing an online portfolio of photographic work can be usefully transferred and built upon to design a bespoke design studio space: what would be its core attributes and how would these help foster the different types of learning styles and outputs reflected in (potentially global) design education? How an on-line environment can offer effective support to peer learning and reflection. How can communities of practice evolve in this context; what specific attributes of an ‘open design studio’ will help these to grow?

Working in teams and developing learning skills of co-creation, participation and critical review are important elements of design education. Can the assessment process help foster participative, co-learning in group-focused design projects?

Finally we would like to ask: is it right that distance education must always seek to emulate F2F for validation? While traditional studio-based design education appears to foster communities of practice it is important to ask 'how inclusive are these communities?' Given the phenomenal rise of social networking sites such Facebook it seems possible that online communities of practice can have a significance far beyond the limited friendship groups that emerge within F2F study.  Given the importance of ICT skills in competitive jobs markets it seems plausible that distance education can develop ICT skills better than F2F. There is constant reinforcement in the researching, planning, submitting and reflecting on feedback within assignments.

3. More generally, can design - a subject with a strong peer-oriented, studio-based interactive education history - be taught and learned through a distance learning environment.

http://designthinking.typepad.com/dialogues/3-design-thinking-distance.html

In this context there are issues of diversity of students’ background and physical location. Design Thinking will be presented for the first time in 2010. In the first years of its presentation, it is expected that the majority of students will be based in the UK. It is often underestimated in distance education that, although being based within the UK, students are geographically and ’culturally’ dispersed. These disparities can mainly be found in students’ age, professional and educational backgrounds. Awareness about such increasing diversity in the area of expertise in design can be gained through knowing about diverse design practices or engaging in diverse design practices.  

Bios

Dr Peter Lloyd is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Design, Development, Environment and Materials at the Open University.  His research interests lie in the areas of Design Thinking and Design Ethics and particularly in the social discourse of Designing. He has taught at Cranfield University in the UK, at The TU Delft in the Netherlands, and is now Course Team Chair for U101: Design Thinking at the Open University. 

Dr Steve Garner is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Design, Development, Environment and Materials. He is the Course Team Chair for Design and Designing, and contributes to other courses. Research interests include the use of representations in design (particularly sketching), usability in product design, and computer supported collaborative designing. He is Director of the international Drawing Research Network. 

Georgy Holden is a lecturer in the the Department of Design, Development, Environment and Materials and chairs the level three course T307 Innovation: designing for a sustainable future. Her research interests include the use of photo-sharing in the development of visual literacy and the use of ICTs in design education. She is the holder of three Open University Teaching Awards for work on courses using innovative teaching methods and resources. 

Emma Dewberry work within the Design Group at the Open University; her academic focus is design for sustainability. Emma has worked in this field for nearly two decades; she is a strong advocate of the importance of design and design thinking in giving form to the inputs and outputs of our lifestyles in the context of ecological limits. She has lectured widely on these issues and held academic positions at Loughborough University, Goldsmiths College, University of Cambridge and Cranfield University, teaching both undergraduate and postgraduate design courses. Her recent research explores the need for personal and cultural transformations in building new knowledge and wisdom of our relationship as nature and its importance in fostering radical sustainable innovation.

Dr. Nicole Schadewitz is lecturer at the Open University. Her professional background is graphic and multi-media design. Her research background is international collaboration in design education. During her PhD research she gained understanding of how cultural differences influence design education across national and geographical boundaries. Now, she is member of the Design Thinking course development team at the Open University. 

References

Garner S. 2005. Distance design education: Recent curriculum development at the Open University. Crossing Design Boundaries, the Engineering and Product Design Education (E&PDE05) conference, Napier University, Edinburgh, 15-16 Sept. Eds., Rogers, P., Broadhurst L., & Hepburn D., pp377-381, Taylor Francis. London.    

Holden G & Garner S. 2005. e-Learning in the development of design skills and knowledge at the Open University. Proceedings of Designs on e-Learning, International conference on teaching and learning with technology in art, design and communication, University of the Arts, London, 14-16 Sept.    

Cross, N. 2006. Designerly Ways of Knowing. Springer Verlag. London.