« Return to Thread: Teaching IxD through design challenges: Which challenges?

Re: Teaching IxD through design challenges: Which challenges?

by John Wood-2 :: Rate this Message:

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Hi Parag,
Many thanks for your response

> Just wanted to say that within the field of design, where the  
> designer is
> involved in reflective practice, the problems are set by the designers
> themselves. Even when designers are given a problem by their  
> clients, they
> do not accept the problem as given. Instead, they view the problem  
> given as
> an ill defined problem which is then solved by setting and resetting  
> the
> problem.

Sure, problem setting is as much a part of design as problem solving.  
In practice, I spend more time defining and understanding the problem  
than I do in solving it. But that doesn't change what I'm looking for.  
I would like to compile a set of design challenges that people can  
undertake in the context of a design process, including problem  
setting. I'd also like to define the sorts of issues the challenge  
illustrates, so that discussion of the challenge can be an opportunity  
to learn more than just what one solution to one instance of a problem  
might be.

This is akin to an IxD pattern library, although not exactly the same  
thing. Each pattern in a library sets out a common problem and  
discusses potential solutions. I'd like to do the same thing, but not  
provide a solution – just set the problem, and I'd like good notes on  
what sorts of common interaction design issues each challenge poses.  
Does that make sense?

A good example of the sort of thing I have in mind is the problem set  
in Cooper's Interaction Designer recruitment aptitude test (http://www.cooper.com/documents/Careers_Exercise_IxDG.pdf 
), where applicants are asked to look at a poorly designed interaction  
in MS Word and redesign it. If I could compile a list of challenges of  
that sort of scale, with good notes as to the nature of the  
Interaction problems encountered in each challenge, that'd be ideal.

> I have used this process to teach interaction design at the  
> University of
> Limerick, Ireland for last four years and I have seen very encouraging
> results. I'll be happy to discuss more on this should you have any  
> questions
> or comments.

Sure, I'd be happy to talk to you off list on this.

regards

John
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 « Return to Thread: Teaching IxD through design challenges: Which challenges?