Tag: design pedagogy

Eat Your Vegetables: Sneaking in Conceptual Thinking During Technical Instruction

Suzanne Dell’Orto
Adjunct Lecturer
Fine & Performing Arts
Baruch College, CUNY

“Eat Your Vegetables: Sneaking in Conceptual Thinking during Technical Instruction” is an experiential progression of graphic design projects that helps to introduce and refine the technical skills essential to professional practice. More important, it overlays other 21st century skills, adding pedagogical depth to the skill-building through an implicit layer of meaning-making, critical thinking, and abstract and symbolic thinking.

My introductory graphic design class is mandated to build the skills to communicate ideas and cover the essence of branding (a highly competitive game of attention-getting, recognition and trust), and the class is enriched by the addition of a critical thinking element. Students imagine, conceptualize, then filter and form allegiances to a random “theme word” assigned at the beginning of the semester. The challenge of deepening the development of this key word threads through 15 weeks of instruction, intersecting critical thinking with learning technical skills. This approach also allows the mimicking of a real-life designer/client relationship, using the theme word as a surrogate client. Students also learn and use tools for thinking in the curricular sequence, some borrowed from other domains such as the writing process of “word mapping”.

Attendees will learn, in this illustrated lecture, that the complexities of contemporary professional practice and the competitive global business context demand a critical and creative approach to foundational coursework––well-prepared hands, eyes, and minds.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 3.1: Kean University on Saturday, Oct 22, 2016.

Major and Life Design for a Wild New World

Karen M. Cardozo, M.Ed., PhD
Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies
Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts

Some undergraduate institutions offer an interdisciplinary or special major where students integrate their interests and passions to design their own programs of study. In Finding Your Way in a Wild New World (2013), this method is recommended to everyone by social scientist and life coach Martha Beck. Arguing that social structures (including those related to work) are changing faster than conventional education or strategic planning processes can keep pace, Beck suggests that we can best navigate this rapidly shifting landscape by following our instincts and using all five senses in a more fluid, situationally responsive way. This dovetails with Daniel Pink’s thesis in A Whole New Mind (2006) that we have entered a Conceptual Age in which the most successful enterprises will be “high touch” (providing face to face or interactive services that cannot be outsourced) and/or “high concept” (tapping the creative, visual capacities of the right brain in addition to the analytic, verbal capacities of the left brain that are most elicited by educational systems). Barbara Sher (2006) agrees, adding that integrative or interdisciplinary orientations of the polymath types she calls “scanners” will be particularly in demand. Design communication serves as an ideal nexus for all of these insights.

Inspired by Stanford’s Design your Stanford and Design Your Life courses, this presentation argues that 21st century pedagogy should relinquish an outmoded “information age” attachment to content coverage in favor of more self-reflexive learning in which students apply open-ended and iterative design principles to fully maximize their own curiosity, inclinations and opportunities—in college and beyond. As a concrete case study, we’ll look at MCLA’s Interdisciplinary Studies (IDST) program as helpful “design your major” intervention, and present a scaled-up counterpart in life design from one IDST World of Work course, whose final research project requires students to design their lives in two alternate universes: one, the life they think they are planning and the other a path that might unfold from a different point of departure and in response to unpredicted setbacks, risks taken, or plain dumb chance. The resulting insights reveal that while the future is unpredictable, the value of design thinking as a method for navigating the unknown is quite clear.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 3.0: Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA) on Saturday, Sept 24, 2016.

The Graphic Design Portfolio: Process Over Product

Irina Lee
Design Director, Bureau Blank
Adjunct Lecturer, School of Visual Arts
Adjunct Lecturer, Department of Visual Communications: Art + Graphic Design
SUNY Farmingdale

Portfolio preparation can be a friendly approach to learning time management, identifying personal career goals, and transitioning from a student to a professional practice. 
 
“Live Interviews + Networking Night” was born out of the necessity to focus and motivate the graphic design seniors. Over the course of 6 weeks, the work leading up to the “big night” provides a real-world setting for students to research the design industry, identify personal career goals, iterate, self-initiate the necessary portfolio work, articulate their work through written case studies, seek out help and feedback from design professionals, and learn to make their own decisions. Instead of the traditional teacher/student reviews, students seek reviews from industry professionals and supplement their work with group reviews and self evaluations. 
 
Through this process, students gain confidence in their work, become stronger writers, improve collaboration and group facilitation skills, and learn how to build their networks. The talk will include students’ work, teaching methods, and tips for anyone interested in incorporating a similar model into their upper-level design courses.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 1.2: New York City College of Technology on Friday, October 31, 2014.

Design Incubation Colloquium 1.1: Queens College

Tuesday, August 26, 2014
Conference Room, Klapper Hall
Queens College
65-30 Kissena Blvd.
Queens, NY 11367-1597

Presentations

Definining Practice, Redefining Education: Five Case Studies
Juliette Cezzar
Associate Director & Assistant Professor
BFA Communication Design
Parsons the New School for Design

Reality Check: Learning About the Difference Between Design and Designer
Yue Chen
Art Director
Office of Visual Communication
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

Engaging the Campus Community with Design Thinking
Andrew DeRosa
Assistant Professor
Queens College, CUNY

Attendees

  • Liz DeLuna, Associate Professor, St. John’s University
  • M. Genevieve Hitchings, Assistant Professor, CityTech—CUNY
  • Lisa Maione, Adjunct Lecturer, Parsons—The New School, Queens College—CUNY
  • Grace Moon, Assistant Professor, Queens College—CUNY
  • Aaris Sherin, Associate Professor, St. John’s University
  • Ryan Hartley Smith, Assistant Professor, Queens College — CUNY
  • Kathryn Weinstein, Assistant Professor, Queens College—CUNY
  • Dan Wong, Assistant Professor, CityTech—CUNY

 

Reality Check: Learning About the Difference Between Design and Designer

Yue Chen
Art Director
Office of Visual Communication
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

Design critic Ralph Caplan wrote: “Learning how to write is not the same as being a writer.” The same principle holds true when it comes to design, and yet this simple truth is often forgotten in the classroom. While students are expected to learn how to design, many have failed to realize that technique alone does not automatically make them designers—attitude and work ethnic are just as important. In this presentation, I will discuss a few real-life lessons I developed to help students become more aware of the choices they make as designers, and how those choices can, for better or worse, affect their own lives and the well-being of society.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 1.1: Queens College on Tuesday, August 26, 2014.

Design Incubation Colloquium 1.0: Inaugural Event at AIGA

Thursday, June 5, 2014
2:30pm-4:30pm
AIGA
Minnesota conference room, 3rd Floor
164 5th Ave, New York, NY 10010
RSVP required, limited seating

Presentations

ABC’s of Type Design
Liz DeLuna
Associate Professor of Graphic Design
St. John’s University

Using Printmaking Techniques to Teach Metacognitive Skills to Design Students
Sharon (Libby) Clarke
Assistant Professor
Advertising Design and Graphic Arts
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

Design Considerations for Low Literacy Audiences: A Case Study
Kathryn Weinstein
Associate Professor of Graphic Design
Queens College, CUNY

The Unique Challenges of Defining Research and Scholarship for Communication Design Academics
Dan Wong
Assistant Professor
Advertising Design & Graphic Arts
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

Design Bravery: Managing Fear and Facilitating Development through Collaboration
Lisa J. Maione, Art Director / Designer
Adjunct Professor, Queens College CUNY
Part-time Lecturer, Parsons The New School for Design

Service-learning: A Natural Fit in Design Education?
M. Genevieve Hitchings
Assistant Professor
Advertising Design & Graphic Arts
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

Attendees

  • Mary Ann Biehl, Chair, Associate Professor, CityTech—CUNY
  • Anita Giraldo, Assistant Professor, CityTech—CUNY
  • Tanya Goetz, Assistant Professor, CityTech—CUNY
  • Joel Mason, Professor, CityTech—CUNY
  • Joe Moore, Assistant Professor, City College—CUNY
  • Jane Pirone, Assistant Professor, Parsons—The New School
  • Susan Spivack, Program Director, Associate Professor, Kingsborough—CUNY

 

Service-learning: A Natural Fit in Design Education?

M. Genevieve Hitchings
Assistant Professor
Advertising Design & Graphic Arts
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

College level design courses can provide students with opportunities to work effectively in collaboration with actual clients. Such projects, undertaken jointly by faculty, students, and clients, develop student skills not only in design, but also in research, and in communicating with the public. Carefully chosen projects can also be of benefit to society, and offer advantages over work confined to the classroom. Since a large part of what we do in communication design is geared at problem solving for clients, service learning seems a natural fit in design education; and presents students with unique opportunities to work on projects focused on critical social issues. And yet when put into practice ethical dilemma can arise that are not so simple to navigate when teaching a class. This presentation highlights difficulites faculty-contemplating bringing a client into a design class may encounter.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 1.0: Inaugural Event at AIGA on Thursday, June 5, 2014.

Using Printmaking Techniques to Teach Metacognitive Skills to Design Students

Sharon (Libby) Clarke
Assistant Professor
Advertising Design and Graphic Arts
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

As we educators wrestle with the shifting significance of print in our classrooms, we risk losing equipment, space, and funding for printmaking techniques that are seen as being no longer relevant. This study works to prove that techniques including relief printing, letterpress and lithography can be instrumental in bridging the gap between the haptic and the conceptual for poorly performing students. It strives to demonstrate that printmaking lessons are ideal for teaching the bedrock metacognitive skills so many low-performing or disadvantaged students lack when they come into our classrooms. These observations are posited to help cement printmaking’s continued place in our institutions and our curricula.

This year-long study focuses on the application of current educational theories through printmaking lessons to help beginning students improve markedly in a college setting. Specifically, metacognitive strategies are taught through printmaking projects in order to reach and support the lowest performing students in a variety of design classes and art workshops. The problem-solving skills inherent in printmaking makes it a particularly good medium to help students overcome difficulties to find connections to new material, thereby providing them with the confidence and context they need to succeed academically.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 1.0: Inaugural Event at AIGA on Thursday, June 5, 2014.

Design Bravery: Managing Fear and Facilitating Development through Collaboration

Lisa J. Maione, Art Director / Designer

Adjunct Lecturer, Queens College CUNY
Part-time Lecturer, Parsons The New School for Design

Finding one’s voice as a designer is a continuous process which calls upon our inner confidence. We hone a specific type of confidence — a ‘design bravery’ — that comes in many forms, at all scales, and with practice. At Queens College, Graphic Design 1 is the first course where we explore form, material, meaning, and context in 2D design. Even from early on in the semester, voice is practiced, challenged, and strengthened. With various rolls of colored of painter’s tape, the students in the class are asked, “As a collaborative group, design and produce the most interesting line connecting Point A and Point B.” Points A and B are marked as X’s on two far points. The students have made lines in classrooms, hallways, an outdoor sitting area, staircases, and a stretch of high-traffic hallway connecting two buildings. There are very few rules: “Nothing should inhibit anyone’s safe passing through the space; Everything must be within reach to be removed; Respect school property.” Armed with blue, pink, green, and yellow tape as their tools, the class begins to negotiate. Who begins? Where does the first mark go? Is there a unifying theme? Before long, an expansive, collaborative, visual vocabulary is built. Along the line, the students encounter texture, color, typography, overlap, transparency, contrast, movement, rhythm, time. As the group is working, a curious passerby asks a question; a student explains what they are doing. The line is interactive and public, both in-process and at its end. Without fail, every “basic design principle” naturally emerges from the line and is ripe for discussion. The line shows us that graphic design does is indeed not specialized nor unfamiliar. Graphic strategies rise up when we create the simplest gesture with a basic tool. From here, our semester adventure is able to begin.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 1.0: Inaugural Event at AIGA on Thursday, June 5, 2014.