Facilitating collaborative design: New publication

by | Sunday, May 10, 2020

Essential tensions in design. Image designed by Punya Mishra

Design facilitators play an important role in the open-ended collaborative design process. This becomes even more important as design based approaches expand to groups and teams that may not be as familiar with the process as expert designers may be. Facilitators support small group interactions to help generate ideas, structure discussions and guide the process with minimal friction.

Despite this increased focus on collaborative design in contexts outside of professional design, such as education, there is little research to inform facilitators in productive and thoughtful ways to navigate this process.

We build on our personal experience as facilitators in a collaborative, multi-stakeholder, educational design workshop to provide insights into the process. We identify a range of “essential tensions” that exists within multiple aspects of facilitator roles and practices—including processes, products, discussion flow, and group dynamics. More in the paper below:

Henriksen, D., Jordan, M., Foulger, T.S., Zuiker, S. & Mishra, P. (2020). Essential Tensions in Facilitating Design Thinking: Collective Reflections. Journal of Formative Design in Learning. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41686-020-00045-3

A few randomly selected blog posts…

We Have Always Been Rhizomatic

We Have Always Been Rhizomatic

Danah Henriksen and I were recently asked to write a foreword for a book titled New Directions in Rhizomatic Learning: From Poststructural Thinking to Nomadic Pedagogy edited by Myint Swe Khine. This was a fun foreword to write and allowed us to explore a range of...

Good Evil Ambigram

Brad Honeycutt, a fellow Spartan (he graduated 1996 a couple of years before I started here at Michigan State) is fascinated by optical illusions. He has completed a couple of books on optical illusions the first of which will be coming out in July. Scott Kim, one of...

Lego based Sudoku & Rubik Cube solving robots

Two robots made entirely using Lego Mindstorms NXT Retail-kit that can solve Sudoku problems and the Rubik's Cube! How totally cool is that. LEGO Mindstorms is a line of Lego sets combining programmable bricks with electric motors, sensors, Lego bricks, and Lego...

Limerick on Math & Beauty

Image credit: eoliene_pe_campii Mathematical Beauty: A limerick Punya Mishra, Jan 27, 2010 Doesn’t it just gladden your heart to see These games we can play with infinity? How can one stay aloof From the elegance of a proof And remain immune to mathematics’ subtle...

Thanks Wipro & Microsoft

#MSUrbanSTEM Thanks Wipro! #MSUrbanSTEM Thanks Microsoft Over this past summer I have had one of the best teaching/learning experiences of my career. Through a project funded by Wipro (and with support from Microsoft) we have the opportunity to work with 125 teachers...

Designing learning futures through reflective practice: 1 of 2

Designing learning futures through reflective practice: 1 of 2

This is the first of two posts on the topic of bringing principled innovation practices to designing learning futures. The first post (co-authored by Punya Mishra & Cristy Guleserian) focuses on the need for designing learning futures, and how the PI practices...

Mindfulness & Creativity: New article

Mindfulness & Creativity: New article

Mindful and Creative: Building Educational Systems for Individual and Community Wellbeing In a technology-immersed world awash in distraction, stress, and often, distress—all of which can affect creativity and wellbeing—mindfulness is increasingly becoming a valuable...

Blurred visions: Another history of TPACK

Blurred visions: Another history of TPACK

I had posted recently a video based on a talk I had given at ASU. In that video I spoke about the role of theory in research through a history of the TPACK framework. You can see the video here. Now, my TPACK partner in crime, Matt Koehler, has created his own...

EDUsummIT 2019: eBook released

EDUsummIT 2019: eBook released

EduSummIT is a global community of policy-makers, researchers, and educators working together to move education into the digital age. EDUsummIT has been convening every two years since 2009. In each case the participants focus on some significant theme relevant to...

0 Comments

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *