Child and Play Perspectives

How do children (0-12 years old) perceive the world? How do they make sense of it through their play? How can designers cater for these play needs? These questions are at the core of the course on Child and Play Perspectives. The course is a mix of weekly in-class sessions, playful exercises, self-study and reflective mini-essays.

In a group, you will set up, execute and analyse two generative sessions with English-speaking children visiting our faculty. You will derive themes for play from these sessions. You will study core theory and practices of children's play and perform a series of play exercises yourself. And you will use all the insights you gain to ideate on "playthings" (toys in the broadest sense of meaning). Through this course, you will gain understanding and competence in uncovering children's perspectives and designing responsible play products for and with children.

This is a playful course. You are invited to play along!

The study goals of this course will be assessed by:

Formative assessment of individual reflections and group design exercises of each "learning block" are offered on a continuous basis, depending on students' chosen moment of sharing preliminary work. The rubric will be utilized as the basis for feedback on formative deliverables.

Summative assessment:

One single summative assessment takes place at the end of the course, of two items:

1) final version of the series of individual reflections (mini-essays).

2) annotated "design map" (the series of co-creation findings and compact designs); this is group work.

PASS/FAIL assessment is applied in this course.