Week 5
Design Practice 1 exercise and its connection to practice and research project.
https://akankshasexplorationsblog.design.blog/design-practice-1/summative-assessment/
Week 4
Week 4 – Homework ExerciseW
The article stresses on the importance of outdoor play areas as learning environment for children. The author mentions how quality play (which includes free play and discovery) involves the whole child: gross motor, fine motor, senses, emotion, intellect, individual growth and social interaction. He also discusses how children’s opportunities to interact in a naturalized outdoor setting are greatly diminished today. The importance of nature in children’s play areas is well described in the article which states that natural elements provide for open-ended play that emphasizes unstructured creative exploration with diverse materials. Nature also invites longer and more complex play. Because of their interactive properties nature stimulates discovery, dramatic pretend play, and imagination. Natural settings offer qualities of openness, diversity, manipulation, exploration, anonymity and wildness. The article also describes a ‘discovery play garden’, where the spaces are informal and naturalistic so they can stimulate high quality free play and discovery learning. These gardens are also much looser in design as loose parts have infinite play possibilities, and their total lack of structure and script allows children to make of them whatever their imaginations desire. The article also states that it is desirable to integrate the outdoors with the indoor classroom with one sense of place and identity, so the transition between the two will be almost seamless. Design that allows children to go freely back and forth between inside and outside encourages children to experiment with autonomy from adults, both physically and symbolically. It also allows the outdoor space to become part of the classroom, rather than just a retreat from it.
The article adds to the inspiration of my research. It emphasizes the need for free play area for children. The article closely resembles my idea of having an outdoor-indoor transition space for children which can encourage free-play, discovery and holistic development of children. It also inspires me towards creating a more biophilic design for my research project and assures my belief about children’s interaction with nature and its scope in learning.
Experimental Process that I am currently testing in my practice: The exercise in Design Practice 1 – where, I picked up five words, defined those words and then twisted and turned them around to get new meanings of those words. I related those words to my practice and created narratives, drawings, models, objects which evoked those words and their new meanings. These words have now started interacting with my research project and have grown into ideas and concepts for my project.
This conceptual model was made to define the word ‘contours’. After delving into various meanings of this word I saw contours as patterns. Patterns could be man-made or by nature. This was a suggestive pattern which could be an interesting play for kids. Through deeper explorations, I thought if I could give these patterns different scales – its meaning would change. So they could be just windows where children could sit and look out or cozy spaces where they could sit indoors. The material which these would be made with could change to give each one a different feeling. These would form spaces where children can play with loose objects. Some could be just translucent. The pattern could also be the roof of the space with undulating mounds of greens which would form free play spaces outdoors. One of these could just be scaled and projected out to become a slide which connects the outdoor to indoor. Some of these together could form steps to reach higher up- where one of these could be a telescope to look out. These cylindrical shapes could form musical stepping drums at different levels. Few of these could be solid and form draw/ paint surfaces for children. Few of them could have concave and convex mirrors on them for play. While connecting inside out the pattern could encourage interesting peek-a-boo sessions. Starting from this word contour – now this model is giving clues to make an experiential space which can be punctured by colorful kids and give them a holistic learning experience through free play creating numerous interesting narratives for life.
Week 4 – Class Worksheet
Write down three keywords that relate directly to your research aims
Experiential space, Children, Free-play
Write down your 4 updated aims
1. To enable natural creativity and freedom of play and learn in children (aged 2-7 years) by reconceiving spaces for them.
2. To enhance experiential quality of spaces for children in order to stimulate all their senses.
3. To promote dynamic free play in children and ensure good social, physical and emotional heath (holistic development)
4. To encourage foundation of a child-friendly community.
Write down 4 draft research questions (the research questions should be derived from your aims and modified after the feedback you received in class)
1. How can we rejuvenate spaces for children to encourage their natural creativity and exploratory free play in order to achieve good social, physical and emotional health of children so that our community can be truly child-friendly?
2. How can we encourage holistic development of children by reconceiving spaces for them which enables their natural creativity and freedom of play and learn in order to ensure a child-friendly community?
3. How can we create experiential spaces for children, which can encourage their natural creativity and freedom of play and learn in order to achieve holistic development of children so that our community spaces can be child-friendly?
4. How can we encourage holistic development of children by reconceiving spaces for them to be more experiential in order to nurture their natural creativity, dynamic free play and imagination for providing a foundation towards child-friendly community spaces?
Write 5-8 research methods that will assist you in achieving your aims/question.
1. Observational Methods – to observe children’s behaviour, interactions and their learning/play environments
2. Field Research – looking at current spaces for children
3. Case Studies
4. Photographic documentation
5. Drawing/ sketching, planning
6. Prototyping, 3D visualization
7. Material Research
8. Visual Survey
Identify 2-3 of the research methodologies related to your own research and say why they are related below:
Methodology 1 – Phenomenological Research to study the sensory/haptic experiences of children with their environment.
Methodology 2 – User-Centred Design Research as the research revolves around children, their spaces and people related to them.
Methodology 3 – Material Culture research, New Materialism – to study the relationship between children and their things, their environment.
Identify below how your research relates to methodologies 1, 2 and 3.
Methodology 1 – Phenomenological Research to study the sensory/haptic experiences/perception of children with their environment. This would help in understanding how different materials/ textures affect children. This methodology will also help to understand the curiosity children have towards different types of play. This research will enable me to use my direct experiences with children during the process, also parents and teachers’ experiences with children to produce in depth knowledge about their perspective of spaces.
Methodology 2 – User-Centred Design Research as the research revolves around children, their spaces and people related to them. This research will involve gathering requirements for spaces and their types, testing their current usability in order to design and evaluate. This would be a participatory method which will involve questionnaires and interviews with children, teachers and relatives to gather requirements and evaluate.
Methodology 3 – Material Culture research, New Materialism – to study the relationship between children, their spaces and culture. This will include the natural environment/man-made spaces and its materials. The inter relationship between children their spaces would be studied in relation to its making, history, preservation and interpretation. This research will also help give insights about ideas, beliefs, habits and values of children and their care takers. It will be useful to explore different materials which would develop sensory/experiential spaces.
Week 3
Research question updated
How can we create a sensory design of space for children which enables/liberates them to learn, play, nurtures their creativity and imagination in order to achieve holistic development for children.
Keywords: Children, sensory design, liberates, creativity, imagination, holistic development
Outcome of Mix and Match Methods Exercise
This exercise was very useful to get feedback from my peers about my research. It helped me rethink my contexts and refine my research question. It helped me delve into the why, how and what for so many things and clarify my thoughts. I am trying to improve the clarity of my research question based on the feedback received. This exercise also helped me understand the various types of methods and methodologies in research. The feedback from peers helped identifying which of these could be used for my research along with suggestions as to how it could help my research. The suggestions and comments have been very valuable to address the next step towards compiling the worksheet which gives clearer understanding of the keywords, aims, research question, methods and methodologies which I would use for my resear
Week 3 involved studying various types of Methods and Methodologies. We were given tasks to write about few methods and methodologies. Following are the Methods and Methodologies that I defined for the class-
Observational Method is a method of data collection in which the researcher observes within a specific field of study. The researcher could be observing mainly two areas. Firstly it could be structures and settings i.e. the place/location and elements in the space. Secondly it could be behaviours and interactions of the people located there which are many times influenced by the space and its elements. Observational Method could be Structured/Controlled when it is conducted using specific variables and a predefined schedule i.e. the researcher decides the place, time and circumstances. For example, a researcher used a behavior schedule to study how infants responded to brief periods of separation from their mothers. Controlled observations are generally overt and non-participatory. Observational Method could be Naturalistic/Uncontrolled while studying the spontaneous behavior of participants in their natural surroundings. For example, it could be used to study the way of life of different tribes living on islands in the South Pacific. Naturalistic observations could be participatory or non-participatory. They could also be overt or covert.
References: Muratovski , Gjoko. 2016. Research for designers: a guide to methods and practice McLeod, S. A. (2015). Observation methods
Contextual Review is a research method used throughout the lifespan of a research or probably even beyond it to study and analyze the scope of a research project and its contexts in relation to the available knowledge database. It helps in understanding our own research question and gaining more information about its contexts through other studies which have already been done. This method looks into identifying and analyzing what has already been addressed about our research, when, where, by whom and what has not been addressed. This method involves two phases. Phase 1 being Initial survey which enables us to compile a set of relevant references. Phase 2 involves analyzing these references through a critical review in order to identify our own research question and develop an argument.
References: Visualizing Research, A Guide to the Research Process in Art & Design. By: Gray, Carole; Malins, Julian. Aldershot, Hants, England: Routledge. 2004.
Quantitative Research is a means for testing theories by examining the relationship amongst variables which can be measured and the data formulated can be analyzed through statistical procedures. This type of research is ‘independent’ and ‘objective’ as it requires quantifiable/ numerical data for analysis rather than any subjective interpretations. This type of research can either be placed in a natural setting during fieldwork or in a controlled environment within a research facility. This research can be survey oriented, which studies trends, attitudes, opinion of a population or it can be experimental research which studies if a specific study influences an outcome. This type of research is frequently used in marketing and is readily accepted by corporates.
References: Muratovski , Gjoko. 2016. Research for designers: a guide to methods and practice Research Design- Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches by John W. Creswell. 3rd edition. 2009.
Week 2
Research Question
How could spaces for learn and play for children be more sensory/responsive in design?
6 Key Words
Children, sensory design, spaces, learn, play
Research Methods currently used in practice are
- Drawing/sketching/ planning – This is used in conceptualizing ideas, project planning, initial sketching for details and architectural/ interior design cum working drawings of projects.
- Material research – This is extensively used to explore and study the various materials for each project.
- Observational Methods – This is used to study the users/audience for a particular project.
- Prototyping, 3d visualization – this is first used at conceptual level to visualize designs, then to explain the design to users/clients and throughout the design process to test the design/ check on alterations.
Week 2 class worksheet
This involved getting 2 abstracts related to our research project and getting peer feed backs on them which helped in exploring the research question and having a different (peer) opinion about it.
Week 1
Why do I make the things I make?
As a kid I was influenced by a couple who were architects (whom I only met once but they left a deep mark on me) and I was fascinated looking at their work, drawings and models – from that day on wards I wanted to become an Architect (although at that age I never knew what architecture actually meant! I grew up simply wanting to be an architect and led myself towards this journey. Today, I am an proud Architect…an architect by passion. I design spaces because it simply makes me happy! I enjoy the way people and spaces interact with each other. I design spaces to get the best for each client and fulfill their requirements. I always try to design something new or different with a belief and desire to make something better. I also design to earn a living!
How are the things I make located in relation to a wider context?
There are a wide range of contexts and external elements that influence my design. These elements are physical and non-physical. Roads, surrounding buildings, and land contour are examples for physical elements while non-physical elements are the weather condition, local culture,as well as political and financial constraints.
These contexts determine the architectural style, building material selection and site layout, which is particularly beneficial in creating an effective design. So a structure is designed with reference to its wider surroundings. Also, while designing I need to consider the next larger context like a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in the surrounding environment, an environment in a city layout and so on. Therefore anything we build has to be closely related to a wider context.
What impact do I want my work to have, what readings will people make of it?
I would want my work to serve human needs. As an art, I would like my work to provide an outlet for creative expression that leads society to look at their living/working space and the overall environment in different ways. Architecture often affects human behavior and their mood – I would like to create spaces which positively impact people living/working/viewing them. I would like people to experience sensory architecture/responsive architecture – a design which interacts with people, which engages them with their environment and impacts the way they feel, think and behave.
What are the specific “intellectual neighbourhoods” my work is informed by?
The “intellectual neighburhoods” my work is informed by are contemporary architects and interior designers, artists, structural designers, environmentalists, individuals from different fields.
How will thinking about these things improve my practice?
It will add a new dimension to my practice. Dig deeper into my thoughts and create conversations with myself which would help me be more sensitive towards design.
