Design Workshop: Informal Learning

Instructor

Nichole Pinkard

The schools of today are the one place Henry Ford would recognize if he were alive today. Unfortunately this statement is true for a myriad of reasons chief among them being the lack of innovation in the design of educational solutions. This course is an effort to bridge the worlds of education and design through the creation of tools to support student reflection on learning both in and out of school. This workshop will take advantage of the relationship between ID and the University of Chicago's Urban Education Institute. The Urban Education Institute works with a network of charter schools focused on educational innovation. The flagship school, North Kenwood/Oakland Charter School (NKO) has over the past four years serve as a hub for innovation in the use of digital media to improve learning. The school has a four year one-to-one laptop program and a nationally recognized digital media afterschool program. In the fall, NKO will become Carter G. Woodson Middle School and begin its journey towards educating more students by moving into a new state-of-the-art school building, tripling the size of its population, and adapting its curriculum to prepare youth to succeed in the 21st Century. A key step in this direction is the rethinking of the relationship between in-school out-of-school learning through the implementation of X-block and X-Cursions.

• X-Block is a program that allows students to choose from electives that focus on one of the "multiple intelligences" conceptualized by Howard Gardner—linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, and intrapersonal intelligence.

• X-Cursions offers monthly opportunities for all students to explore their own communities, city, and the world around them through field trips, service opportunities, and partnerships with community service organizations, private corporations, and cultural institutions.

While the establishment of X-Block and X-Cursion offers tremendous learning potential, a key road block to the success of each program is the ability to support students in documenting and reflecting on their learning while participating in each of these events.

This workshop will focus on designing innovative solutions to address this problem. ID students will be charged with designing technology tools and social practices that supports middle school students in creating a learning portfolio that documents that achievement of school-based learning standards through both in-school (e.g. classes, projects) and out-of-school (e.g. trips to museums, conversations with peers) learning moments. ID students will be assigned a group of middle school students who will serve as the target audience for the design solution. ID students will be expected to spend time interviewing and observing students learning in both in-school and out-of-school contexts. All design solutions will be presented and discussed with the students and teachers of the Carter G. Woodson Middle School with hopes of eventually building and implementing one or a combination of solutions.

Specifically, through this course students will gain the following experience:

• Interviewing and observing K-12 students and teachers
• Understanding and applying principles of design to a K-12 educational context
• Designing for a ubiquitous computing context
• Designing an innovation to work across multiple contexts (e.g. school, home, and community)

Format & Grading

One fourth of the grade will be based on weekly assignments and class participation. One fourth will be based upon group design proposal for final project. One fourth will be based upon group presentation of final project. One fourth will be based upon individual reflection on final project and group members evaluation of participation.