Teaching Design for Change

I find this TED talk really interesting and inspiring about the Design in Education. Emily Pilloton, the speaker, presented her experience in integrating design not only into a school studio but into a whole rural community. She presented some interesting design principles and approaches that should be considered when designing for education and development.

The first is design for education and it refer to the intersection of the physical construction of the space and materials and the experiences for teachers and students. She implemented this principle through the design of Learning landscape where students play and learn in the school backyard.

The second approach is redesigning education itself in the sense of how education administrated, the services offered , and for whom. The last approach Pilloton and her company used is design with education, which means teaching design thinking using construction and fabrication tools to solve real community problems.

Also, she presented some design principles that I see fundamental for us to consider:

• Design through action
• Design with, not for
• Design systems not stuff
• Document, share, and measure
• Start locally, and scale globally

Adobe Museum of Digital Media

A great idea and creative design. What could be a perfect exhibit to display digital media than a virtual museum?

Massive space, no doors, no guards, interacting with the artworks in its environment, and the museum is always open, that's only few advantages. Regardless of it's creative design, what i consider great about this idea is the virtual environment itself. When i see a digital media artwork in an exhibit, i always feel it missing something. I want to interact with, i want to zoom in and out, i want to flip it upside down, i want to click and see it unfolding of other perspectives, i know that i can but not in a physical space.

www.adobemuseum.com

Panwapa

The website is trying to present basic literacy skills, informations about cultures, through presentations of kids, their lives, communities, stories. The website is really good in delivering those information and skills. However there are some notes that cam make this application much better. What is really good about this website is the use of the graphics, friendly human feedback, interactivity, simple and clear information presentation. As for what is not designed well is the the existence of some dead interactive cues will cause a cognitive overload while providing no benefit, lack of controls while video playing, limited interactivity, poorly designed sign-up tool. The website focus more in the use of question posing, identifying objects and events , note-taking, filtering information, record keeping, scanning for clues.

The the movies are well-produced, the environment were they are presented is not interactive enough. The page lacks certain controls that make the user have control over the presentation of the video while it's playing. Also, controls needed to end the activity before completing it and going back to the previous page not the main page. Though the videos presents a lot of important informations, the questions are not that deep and shed light on those important cues. The game is simply based on recognition skills only. The answer for the questions mostly needs to listen to the video again and identify and click when the answer appear. The rewarding system is based on vocal praise only, it might be better if at least they get scores or indications of their advancement throughout the experience.

www.panwapa.com

Cosmo, the Drifted Hamster

My Canon EOS 550D

I bought my first SLR camera 4 months ago. I love it, however there are few design issues that i have problems with.

The first problem i had is to mount it's lens. I was so excited to try it. Without reading its manuel, I decided to mount the lens intuitively. Toke off the lens cap, attached the lens to the camera body, and clockwise twist and.. it didn't work. It toke me an hour of trial and error till i figured it out which might damage the camera if i tried in a harsh or wrong way. Interestingly enough. that i can now mount any lens even for a different brand of cameras than mine. There are few standard mounting cues and techniques that most of the SLR cameras share and are obvious for a photographer. What I conclude is that before buying my SLR camera, i was in a point and shoot level and my background was not enough for a professional transition. Also, the believe that a professional camera should be fully intuitive and computerized that it will be easier for a computer geek like me, which is not true.

The second problem i had is the lens cap. The design of the lens have no option to keep the cap attached to the lens when it's in use. Instead, every time i have to use my camera, i should de-attache the cap and keep it somewhere else and risking losing it which might lead to damaging the lens itself with over exposure of dust, light and temperature changes. Some lenses have thread that is attach the cap with the lens when is use.

The third problem is with the design of the lens itself. The first advice i get from most manuels, websites, and professional photographer is to buy a filter to protect the lens. The filter is so cheap, that makes me wonder when it's not included in the design itself if the lens. specially that if i mounted a filter, i will not be able to add more lenses to the main lens.

The Fourth issue is with the design of the speaker outlet. It is so close to where i put my thumb. Because its the only finger in the back of the camera and the rest hold the camera from it's side, it is always pressing on the camera so hard that it sweets a lot. The design of the camera body is os great at that area that they make is a little bet harsh and not soft that my thumb doesn't slide when it sweats. The problem is that in a sunny hot day, the sweat get closer to the speaker small holes and I am always tension that it might get inside and damage the speakers at least.

Union Squire Metronome

The Union Squire Metronom is a large public art installation designed with a vision to reflect the "dynamic flux of the city" and nature of time as the designer stated. Each of the three parts convey almost the same message. What's interesting is that thought it's a meant to be a public installation, it seems that almost all visitors didn't get it. let's go into more details:

The Clock: 15 digits number supposed to present the current time in hours, minuts, seconds, and fractions of seconds then the other half indicate the rest of the time left for the day time. As it looks like a whole number with no space in between, it doesn't indicate that there are two different clocks here that gives two sets of information and one should be read left to right and the other right to left. It could be intuitively perceived if there is one space in between the two clocks, unless the vision was to present the impossibility of knowing time.

The other two parts may be well intentioned to be but it's so complex to be perceived. Which rise the question about using complex metaphors and symbols that might not relate to the audience's backgrounds.

I just see it as a waste of space, money, and visitors' energy.

The Doors to Visability

One of the major frustrations i confronted since came to the US, is opening doors. Every time i get closer to entering a building, i have this feeling that there is a challenge waiting for me. My mind start through questions like is it a Pull or a Push door? is it still the same way as last time? how i opened that dor last time? is anyone watching me trying to figure it out? The result is, that i always try to pull first then push if it didn't work regardless of the visual cues.

I am moving this week from my apartment and reading this book "The Design of Everyday Things" made me have a new look to the things i have and the way i should organize them. Simply thinking of their affordances and constraints made me easily get ride of a lot of stuff or reconstruct other to fit in my new place. For a long time, as a user of Things, i was talking things for granted and give the designer high credits and never thought that things might have bad designs. Believing that things have been tested for usability, dropped me in the cave of blaming myself for not being smart enough to intuitively use them.

There is a critical need for a universal design standards that make it easy for most people to use things intuitively. Even when i studied programing and design, have seen many designers design their things the same way they used to use them regardless of the bad design it might have. I believe now that designers have to first, through away all their previous perceptions about what they design and think about its conceptual design as if it's a new invention, then consider their constraints and resources.