DtIL tools
How to design to improve life
Design to improve life education
Education in 2020 is hard to grasp; it encompasses physical and digital classes, traditional subjects and 21st century skills, school curricula and YouTube tutorials. Too often it still means no education at all. At the same time, the complex nature of challenges such as climate change, globalisation or digitalisation, demands, more than ever, a resilient, skilled citizenry, who is actively involved in creating and implementing sustainable solutions. For education, this means that regardless of form, it needs to contain high-quality content as well as the tools required to translate this content into impactful action. Design thinking is a methodological framework that, through structured creativity, helps anyone move from problem analysis to solution-making. At The Index Project, we believe this to be a robust skillset, which needs to be taught in STEM subjects, languages and business classes the same way it is in arts, architecture and design classrooms. But we also see the need to take it a step further, to ensure that solutions to current and future problems not only work but, create a better and more sustainable future. This can only be achieved if the process leading to the solution is geared towards positive impact itself, containing the necessary human-centred focus as well as a dedication to economic, social and environmental sustainability.
Design to Improve Life Education is based on a methodological framework called The Compass, which offers a handson approach to tackling challenges, using cross-disciplinary, user-centred and sustainable processes, methods and techniques. In view of the needs of teachers and facilitators, it was developed for, the Compass also provides pedagogical and didactic principles that simplify the integration of the tools in today's curricula. Initially designed in 2010 over a three-year cross-disciplinary partnership supported by the European Union and Interreg, Design to Improve Life Education is developed continuously based on the local experiences and expertise we encounter in our projects. These span the globe and include inspiring partners, teachers and people dedicated to an empowered next generation. Faced with an uncertain future, providing the best tools and education possible is a commitment that we all share. As our most seasoned jury member Arnold Wasserman says: "there is no bigger design project than creating world 2.0".
Only when we integrate these fundamental principles can we supply students with the tools for creative, solution-oriented working, while fostering skills such as empathy, critical thinking and an innovative mindset at the same time. Liza Chong CEO of The Index Project
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DtIL Tools
In this guide, you’ll find a general introduction to the methodology of the Design to Improve Life Compass, as well as a short introduction to the didactical and procedural foundation that Design to Improve Life Education is built upon. The guide explains the individual design phases thoroughly and includes a series of techniques that are immediately applicable in your teaching practice.
Table of contents Design to Improve Life Education
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• What is design thinking • What kind of skills and competencies do we need for the future? • The role of DTiL in real-life processes and creating solutions • How is Design to Improve Life evaluated? • Examples of Design to Improve Life • Didactic principle concept and method • Roles and relationships in learning processes
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The Design to Improve Life Compass
Sum Up 23. Presentation, Feedforward and Feedback 24. Oracle Round 25. Preparation and Presentation in Final Sum Up
81 82 84 85
The Jokers • Exploration Jokers • Boundary Jokers
86 88 90
10 13 14 16 18 19 21
• Introduction to the Design to Improve Life compass 22 • How do you use the Compass? 24 • The levels of the Design to Improve Life compass 27
Compass phases
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• Introduction to Compass phases
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The Prepare phase 1. Timeline 2. Winners’ Review 3. Portrait and Interview 4. Open Space 5. Formation of Design Teams 6. Mindmap and Focus
32 36 37 38 39 40 41
The Perceive phase 7. Knowledge Mapping and Central Themes 8. Research Strategy 9. Field Work 10. Persona and Heart Diagram 11. Form the Challenge 12. Design Task and Project Description
43 46 48 49 50 52 53
Diagrams for evaluating form, impact and context 95 • The Form diagram • The Impact diagram • The Context diagram
96 98 100
Templates (guiding) 103
The Prototype phase 54 A. Blind Drawing 58 B. Associate and Build 59 C. Walk the Dog 60 13. Persona Models and Role Play 61 14. Rapid Prototyping – 1000 Ideas 62 15. Talking Waterfall 64 16. Idea Poker 66 17. Material Testing 68 18. Mock-up 69 19. User Test 71 The Produce phase 73 20. Design Overview 76 21. Storytelling 77 22. Production of Material for Final Presentation 78
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What kind of skills and competencies do we need for the future?
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The future is a fleeting concept. A moment that'll come a week from now? A year? A decade or millennia from now? They're all in the future if we look at them from our viewpoint of today. Most likely, we’ll have to prepare for them all – but in slightly different ways. For the short-term future; tomorrow, or next year; we have a fair understanding of how the world around us is going to develop, and we can learn specific skills that help us to understand the environment around us. We can learn skills that enable us to take action and change the world, at least a little bit, in a direction we want it to change. If we look further into the future, the uncertainty increases. We don’t know what the world around us is going to be in a decade or several generations ahead. The challenge and the opportunities of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the future of work, are a discussion and an ethical debate we’re only just embarking on. Most of the Earth's surface has been massively transformed through agriculture and urbanisation. The challenges become more complex and interconnected.
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What we do know is that it will be different from the world we are living in today. Hence it becomes essential to learn competencies that help us navigate this change, to enhance creativity, and to bring us all the attitude or the empowerment to grasp and understand the phenomena around us. Design skills and competencies become crucial. We’re learning to ask questions, not just to find answers. As educators, we’re building the competences of the future. Together we create learning experiences that shape what the world around us will become – through every student that enters the world better equipped to ask questions and with the courage, creativity and skills to take action on the world around them. Anna Valtonen, Vice President of Art and Creative Practices, Aalto University, Finland.
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The Design to Improve Life Compass
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Introduction to the Design to Improve Life compass
Sum up
Sum up Sum up
Sum up
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The Design to Improve Life compass consists of four primary levels: The Design to Improve Life Compass (the Compass) is a tool that integrates the three fundamental competencies of the teaching; Design to Improve Life, Didactics and Process.
1. The user The “target market” negatively affected by a specific situation, who will benefit from the design solution.
The Compass is designed to help you and your students navigate, focus and stay on track in the Design to Improve Life process.
2. The four phases Prepare, Perceive, Prototype and Produce – the four main phases in the design process.
The Compass manages the process by offering a clear structure of the process’ and the teaching’s various levels and elements.
3. Twelve concrete actions Three actions plus a final Sum Up of each of the four phases. The actions in each phase are relevant for and support the educational goals of each phase.
At the same time it encourages curiosity, engagement, creativity and innovative thinking, in order to increase both the teacher’s and the students’ spontaneity. The Compass acts as the structure of the Design to Improve Life Education material, and supports the overarching goals for the teaching with concrete actions, methods and techniques, to help the students work through the design process. Thus, the Compass cannot be used without the accompanying education material.
4. A series of techniques that support the actions Several of these techniques are familiar process-tools, which are combined into a new holistic and creative form of teaching. The Compass guides you and your students through the Design to Improve Life process phases. In the Prepare phase, the students choose a challenge they wish to design a solution for. In the Perceive phase, the students research and familiarize themselves with the challenge and how it affects people. After that, the students design, visualize and test possible solutions to the challenge in the Prototype phase. Eventually in the Produce phase, the students finalize and produce their final designs (the final solutions) to the challenge, which are then described and presented in the classroom. After each phase, the students present their output from the individual phase in a Sum Up, where they receive feedback from their fellow students and you, their teacher. Through this process, you secure that the students are at the same level in the process after completing each phase.
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