Abstract
In recent years, initiatives have been made to transition materials and design teaching from a predominantly lecture-based and engineering-dominated subject to one that is more practical and nurturing of experiential knowledge. These initiatives have been sparked by the ever-growing body of research into materials experience and the characterization of materials as an influencer of user experiences. This paper contributes to the dissemination of tools and techniques that can bring teaching and learning of materials experience alive within a design curriculum. It presents the rationale and description of a structured activity entitled Material Love-Hate, specifically developed as a means for students to rapidly develop their materials experience in a classroom or design studio environment. The activity requires students to probe classmates’ appraisals of two owned products: one with product materials that they love and one with product materials that they hate. Quantitative and qualitative data are generated and analysed through the activity. On completion of Material Love-Hate, students demonstrate the expansion of their materials experience by preparing a coursework assignment that relates the appraisal of their two products to sensorial-affective and interpretative categories of materials experience. The paper focuses on activity development and reflection of instructor and student didactic experiences, not on the material appraisal datasets that were generated.
Keywords
materials, user experience, product design, interaction, active learning
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/learnxdesign.2019.17087
Citation
Pedgley, O.(2019) Rapid development of materials experience through active learning, in Börekçi, N., Koçyıldırım, D., Korkut, F. and Jones, D. (eds.), Insider Knowledge, DRS Learn X Design Conference 2019, 9-12 July, Ankara, Turkey. https://doi.org/10.21606/learnxdesign.2019.17087
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.
Rapid development of materials experience through active learning
In recent years, initiatives have been made to transition materials and design teaching from a predominantly lecture-based and engineering-dominated subject to one that is more practical and nurturing of experiential knowledge. These initiatives have been sparked by the ever-growing body of research into materials experience and the characterization of materials as an influencer of user experiences. This paper contributes to the dissemination of tools and techniques that can bring teaching and learning of materials experience alive within a design curriculum. It presents the rationale and description of a structured activity entitled Material Love-Hate, specifically developed as a means for students to rapidly develop their materials experience in a classroom or design studio environment. The activity requires students to probe classmates’ appraisals of two owned products: one with product materials that they love and one with product materials that they hate. Quantitative and qualitative data are generated and analysed through the activity. On completion of Material Love-Hate, students demonstrate the expansion of their materials experience by preparing a coursework assignment that relates the appraisal of their two products to sensorial-affective and interpretative categories of materials experience. The paper focuses on activity development and reflection of instructor and student didactic experiences, not on the material appraisal datasets that were generated.