January 24, 2012
This week I joined as a member of the product design team at Coursekit, a start-up in NYC who is working to change the way we interact through learning online.
I’m the User Experience Lead working alongside new creative director Aaron Carambula and CEO Joe Cohen. We’re just getting started after the first launch of Coursekit last November. Look forward to many great things to come!
January 5, 2012
Homepage Wireframe
The education team was interested in revamping their teacher-specific print resources to make them accessible to any audience online. In Beth’s words, the new site “shouldn’t feel like you walked into the wrong bathroom.” It should be equally interesting and engaging for teachers, students, and modern art enthusiasts.
The education team started putting their ideas into wireframes and quickly realized each of the five team members had different ideas about what a new educational site could be. In our first meeting together I led the team through a series of workshop-style exercises to discover the ideas each person had in mind. In our very first conversation we discussed the project’s constraints – it turned out there were very few – and talked through a couple user scenarios. How would a high school student benefit from the site? How would a teacher use it? What would an enthusiast expect to find?
We started with a strong concept of understanding and addressing each user’s needs. The “wrong bathroom” concept was translated into information architecture throughout the site, starting with the search and browse functions. The site’s primary navigation supports targeted search behavior as well as less active browsing behavior.
Similarly, each page was designed to foster levels of engagement, keeping quick, unexpected content at the top to draw in a reader who may not know what she’s looking for. The site also boasts a comprehensive toolkit for teachers, who may be more focused in their visit and simply looking for the right resource.
Please contact me for detailed work samples.
December 30, 2011
I was invited to join the group as a classroom co-designer and facilitator by Hsing Wei, experience designer and games and education expert. The idea was to conduct two co-design sessions – one with fifth graders in Queens and one with high school students in the Lower East Side – where the output would be material for a panel discussion at the Mobility Shifts conference hosted by Parsons. Our topic was “NYC Students Imagine the 2050 Classroom” and it was our goal to find out from students themselves what the future of the classroom might be.
We had both worked with high school students before and were sure we could plan a successful session for them. However, neither of us had worked with children under the age of 14. What the heck would we do with fifth graders to keep them entertained and engaged?
Our first instinct was to plan the high school session and then reduce its complexity for the fifth graders. We thought it might be helpful for the younger students to have a few more answers than what we would normally give to the more mature students. We planned the arc of the session to provide a mix of inquiry exercises, sketching sessions and reflection, all with the goal of getting the students to design an ideal learning experience for the year 2050.
We didn’t know what to expect when we arrived in Forest Hills. At first it was overwhelming to walk through the halls of a grade school; none of the students was taller than my waist! Finally we arrived in our classroom and met the teacher with whom we’d had a few preparatory phone calls. Soon the students would arrive.
At the last minute, Hsing and I decided to change a few of the activities we had planned. After talking with their teacher, we realized the fifth graders would be far more creative than we had imagined. We decided to throw out many of the examples we had planned to show, and focus instead on asking the right questions for facilitation.
When the students arrived we were delighted to find them alert and excited for our session. We got them warmed up by sharing about ourselves. We talked for a moment about our work as user experience designers, and then asked them to share their names and their favorite books.
We shared our day’s mission with the students: the idea that we could start to re-imagine the classroom using design. First we needed to discover the problem with the current learning environment. We conducted a problem-finding exercise, asking them to call out all the places where they learn. We heard a broad range of ideas, proving our hypothesis that learning happens in many places outside the classroom.
We then asked students to draw a storyboard to tell the story of something they’d learned recently. They had a hard time coming up with ideas for learning that happened outside of school, but with a little nudging their ideas came flowing out.
One student told about learning how to organize his Legos. Another told of an experiment she conducted to learn how long a hot liquid stays warm in a thermos.
When designers talk about redesigning education there’s all kinds of interesting fodder: communication, curriculum, collaboration, environment, context, exploration, and opportunities for delight. We knew it would be difficult for any level student to understand these abstract concepts unless they’ve had a chance to view the education system as an outsider.
We decided to indirectly get to these abstract concepts using concrete, tangible objects that the students could visualize and relate to. We focused on the desk, the blackboard and the notebook in our fifth grade class, splitting them into three groups according to their interests. Again, we asked them to discover the problem first, listing all the qualities – good and bad – of their assigned tool.
After the students had discovered what they already knew about learning and tools we asked them to redesign their object.
The students presented their first round of sketches and received critique from their co-designers. Each student processed the critique with a sharp mind for understanding change. Their wheels were turning the whole time, trying to understand how they might make their idea better.
We then asked them to redesign again. Many groups took what they had already developed and created a new concept that was even better than their first iteration. Some of the students had a hard time understanding why they had to re-sketch the whole idea. “Why can’t we just erase some parts and draw new ones?” With a little nudging they started to re-sketch their ideas and quickly realized that coming up with an entirely new drawing forced them to think of all kinds of new ideas.
We noticed the students stumbling over how to include technology into their ideas. When we suggested using new technology, many students countered, “Well, we can’t use a phone in school so we didn’t think there should be any technology in the new tool.” One group suggested including a printed dictionary in their desk that could be replaced every couple years when updates needed to be made. They theorized that this would be a cheaper option than including a tablet or smart phone, which would be far more expensive to replace if the screen broke.
Ultimately, all their ideas focused on human interaction as the new mode of learning. They were far less interested in including technology than they were at maximizing the time they spend with their peers and teachers each day. This outlook is vastly different from the top-down “use tech to save education” approach taken by many school authorities at the moment.
At the end of our session, we asked the students to create a storyboard to communicate their new product ideas in the form of a narrative. It was a great way for them to individually synthesize all the new ideas they had just dreamed up, and the linear format converted their abstract thinking into concrete terms.
At the end of the day we were thrilled to see all that the students had accomplished. We left the school with an armful of well-thought-out sketches and a hard drive full of video of the students enthusiastically explaining their ideas. The students left with a better understanding of the design process and ideas they were proud to share.
When we met them again for our panel session in October they were still buzzing with excitement about some of their ideas. For us, and for the panel creators, we were excited to show yet another piece of evidence that engaging kids in hands-on, self-directed learning enables them to take ownership of their ideas. They stay engaged, learn better, and get excited to share their work with anyone who’s interested in listening.
Though we were intimidated at first, our experience working with fifth graders was a wonderful way to test our theories about completion. I’m glad we went against our instinct and gave the kids very few answers. Asking them open-ended questions proved to be the right way to teach this specific subject, and they came up with a hundred crazy ideas for new tools that may not have happened if we had given them more direction. With this approach, the challenge for teachers (or co-designers) is being flexible and finding the right questions to ask.
December 19, 2011
Note: This is a working draft of my thoughts on the subject.
When I made plans for my first semester teaching interaction I designed a curriculum around what I thought the students would need and want to learn. My curriculum was successful for many reasons, and there are plenty of areas where I believe it can be improved. I’ve spent an entire semester essentially doing design research on my students. Now that I have a more complete understanding of my user and her needs, I’m able to redesign my curriculum to better complement a student’s interests and educational path.
A few successful outcomes from this semester –
A few areas where I think the class could be improved –
Next semester I’m interested in focusing on nurturing a deeper understanding of people and interactions rather than sharpening my students’ web design skills. Students don’t need to learn as much about hard skills as I’d assumed. Many students asked for instruction in software and code –practical skills that can be learned from the internet. It’s far more important for sophomores and juniors to begin developing a point of view about design and people. They also need to understand their own working methodology, their strengths and weaknesses, and how those can be employed effectively in a team setting. An interaction class should be a platform for all design students to learn about themselves and the people around them, and I believe those abilities will serve them better in their current and future lives.
Emphasis on Doing the Work
A significant piece of the design process lies in iteration. It’s unlikely that your first solution will be the right one, and it’s important to evaluate and revise throughout the process. I noticed my students would create a single sketch and then move forward. They have little desire (or not enough time?) to fully explore concepts through sketching and making.
Evidence of Thinking
I’d like to see more evidence of students’ thinking about projects. It’s okay to turn in one shining, amazing bit of work at the end, but it’s the story of the project before the golden moment of inspiration that is most interesting.
Getting Messy
Students need to understand the materials of our craft before they can create delightful experiences. This understanding only comes from experimentation and failing a whole lot of times until something wonderful emerges from the mess. More Post-Its, more digital and physical sketching. More messing up.
Investigate the Real World
After teaching in many different classrooms I’m convinced that the classroom environment itself is toxic to real learning. We will get out of the classroom as much as possible; it’s essential to understand the real world if we’re going to be designing interactions for real people.
Emphasis on Conceptual Thinking
Many of my students are able to master the tools of web and interaction design. The students who are also able to think conceptually about their projects excelled in my class. Their work is coherent, concise and portable. This is a difficult thing to teach to a classroom full of makers, who instinctively jump into the making before the concept is fully developed.
Systems Thinking
Feedback loops are an essential concept in interaction design. They are the reasons why people want to use the digital products we design. We will focus on systems as both a tool and a principle in interaction design.
My plan for this semester was to create a narrative based on a real-world project. Our semester began with research, then we constructed a website and an app. The semester finished with an open-ended assignment that employed all of the students’ knowledge from previous projects.
The new arc should reflect the way that learning happens, not the way a project happens. In response to Tequila Chan’s outlined methodologies, I’ll be focusing on little loops of Research -> Making -> Reflection/Analysis within projects in the curriculum. His work is based off Kolb’s learning style inventory and McCarthy’s 4MAT learning system. (More to come about this.)
I also want to emphasize the importance of creating incentives (and maybe a little fear) in the classroom. I’ll be reshaping my curriculum with a significant project up front. This will give students a chance to make something right away, and will give me a chance to offer up their first grade early on. It’s a good way to set my expectations for their work. (An aside: I am really not concerned with grades, but the students seem to be. I’d give everyone an A if I could, but I fear they would not be well motivated to continue my class if that were the case.)
Students will be invested in the class from the beginning because there will be an incentive outlined up front. They will not have to wait months to realize the outcome of their hard work. Their first bit of feedback will provide motivation to continue learning, and for the remainder of the semester they will conduct self-initiated investigations into the topics where they’ve personally struggled. These investigations will lead them to an intrinsic awareness of topics in interaction. Finally, they will employ these new skills to create a holistic, well thought out final project that demonstrates their understanding of interaction concepts.
I’d love to hear it. Get me at @pixelkated.
September 28, 2011
From my perspective in the front of the room it’s endlessly fascinating to watch each student react to the material I present. Some students quickly grasp abstract concepts while others are delighted by the challenge of thinking and making tangible, concrete artifacts.
Now that we’ve had a few small critiques those differences have become even clearer. This morning I came across a psychology article titled “Classroom Styles” that presents a relevant framework for thinking about students’ abilities.
My own thinking about styles of learning and thinking has been driven by my “theory of mental self-government,” which I first presented in book format in a volume entitled Thinking Styles. According to this theory, the ways of governments in the world are external reflections of what goes on in people’s minds. There are 13 different styles in the theory, but consider now just three of them. People with a legislative style like to come up with their own ideas and to do things in their own way; people with an executive style prefer to be given more structure and guidance or even told what to do; people with a judicial style like to evaluate and judge things and especially the work of others.
I assigned a group project for the first milestone in my class. I decided to curate each group myself instead of selecting students at random. (A few grad school projects gone awry have taught me the dangers of haphazard pairings!) I categorized each person in my class into one strength: Leader, Doer, or Organizer. After each student was categorized I used my knowledge of their personalities to match the right Leaders, Doers and Organizers with each other.
At the end of the three week project it was clear that the roles I had laid out in my own spreadsheet were reflected in the work that was done. I was delighted to find Sternberg’s approach to be analogous to my own: Leader = Judicial, Doer = Legislative, and Organizer = Executive. I would love to read the rest of his book, Thinking Styles.
There are a lot of other great insights in his article, including a set of problems and methodologies for addressing a variety of classroom learners.
Check it out: Classroom Styles, by Robert J. Sternberg.
June 28, 2011
Morale is low. After five long days running around, playing outdoors, battling mosquitos and (literally) burning out in the sunshine, our group of six teens are exhausted. The same can be said for the adults who have been working even longer days.
All of the fun and games from the past week are a distant memory. We are focused on a single goal; all of our energy is poured into making the construction of our structure a reality. We’re working against our constraints of nature and time, and are struggling to come to consensus about important decisions for the project.
Our conversation and construction was derailed today when we decided to bring in a couple of user test subjects midday to validate the decisions we made. While it can be very useful to bring in test subjects at key points in the process, we brought ours in too late for us to make big changes, and too early for them to suggest little changes. Our test subjects launched a new dialogue that set our students’ minds in another direction from where we had been. On top of that, some of the students who had been left out of the key decision making processes were unhappy with the results and didn’t hold back their opinions (a true testament to the value of co-creation exercises with clients!).
After our rocky discussion Alex and I made the difficult decision to walk away from the problem. We sent the kids off for an ice cream break and then left them to work on a new prototype without our guidance. After thirty minutes the students came up with a new idea and built a mockup. After a brief check-in and another twenty minutes they pushed their design a little farther. The previously divergent group had come to a new decision together, one that everyone was excited about.
When we rejoined them, the attitude of the group was completely turned around. The students had reclaimed ownership of the prototype construction and were able to find enthusiasm and new energy for the work. Frowns of disappointment and frustration turned into excited smiles, eagerly anticipating the next step in the building process.
It was a difficult experience as a teacher to lead these students through this trying experience. I’m very glad to have Alex here to guide our teaching efforts and the learning experience for the students. He showed great calm under pressure and was willing to go into the problem a little deeper, trusting that there would be something great on the other end of the tunnel.
June 27, 2011
We learned a few key things about the constraints for our design from our research and requirements gathering:
It must be in an area with cell phone reception
It must keep out the bugs (mosquitos!), rain and sun, and withstand high winds
It should be private enough for a phone conversation and public enough to hold a small group of 2-3 people
It must be portable or easily broken down
We started by laying out plans for the structure on our newly established site. Everyone was hesitant to make decisions and get into the activity at first. Finally someone picked up a 1×2 and started zip tying it to another piece of lumber. The whole team fell into place. We all followed each others’ moves, quickly working together to build a sketch of the still-to-come concept.
We worked the rest of the day to turn our 3D sketched plans into reality. We measured and laid the framework for the decking and worked past sunset into the darkness of the night to lay the tongue and groove flooring on top of our frame. The whole team moved in a single direction with each of our six students performing a micro-task that fed into the whole. A rhythm developed out of their work: lay down a plank, mallet it into place, drill the holes, screw it in, next! Observing the whole scene was like watching an orchestra of design- and power tool-driven passion.
We’ve been so lucky with this phenomenal group of students. They instantly clicked with each other on our very first day driving to Taliesin, and that bond translates to all the work we’ve done in the field these past few days.
If we had been inside a classroom it would have taken weeks for Alex and I to teach our students to understand the rhythm and cadence of a project. It’s not a cut and dry lesson — they have to experience it completely see the value. Being here in the woods in a fast-paced, hands-on learning environment has forced them to learn about the nuances of teamwork quickly. I’m glad they discovered it and made it work so well.
June 26, 2011
During our time here at Taliesin we’re working very long days. We start moving around 8am each day and don’t go to sleep until after Midnight. They’re long days for me, an adult who generally has good control of my crankiness, and they’re really long days for the bunch of 16–18 year olds along with us.
I’ve discovered a few secrets for keeping everyone’s energy levels up:
Drink tons of water! It’s true that it will give you more energy than coffee or soda.
Dance.
Sing.
Anytime the group’s mood is down I find myself jumping around like an idiot, singing Spice Girls (circa 1997) and explaining, err, showing them how Scary Spice did the jump kick after the second verse in the video.
And it totally works.
Everyone is instantly laughing (perhaps at me, not with me) and back on track, forging ahead to whatever our end goal is that day.
The last few days have been completely amazing. Our little group has grown together like a family, complete with an 11-person sit down dinner at a single table last night. I’m happy to provide a little comic relief if it helps everyone bond a little stronger by creating some ridiculous memories of their time here.
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On another note, I’m totally destroyed! My shoulders, legs and arms are dying from all the strange exertion I’ve been doing. I have bug bites and scratches and yesterday I accidentally stabbed my finger with the tip of a knife. But who cares! I wouldn’t trade any of that for what we’re learning here each day.