Historically, Product Design (PD) student projects primarily address design processes only. As a result, critical areas such as Benchmarking, Marketing and Costing are often deemed extraneous or, at best, additive. In a 2016... [ view full abstract ]
Historically, Product Design (PD) student projects primarily address design processes only. As a result, critical areas such as Benchmarking, Marketing and Costing are often deemed extraneous or, at best, additive. In a 2016 Irish Times publication (MacCraith, 2016), Brian MacCraith outlined the critical skills most frequently identified by employers as important, including communication, teamwork, critical thinking, leadership, empathy, cultural awareness, creativity and innovation. In this analysis, the inherited PD approach is compared, empirically, with the quality of the work produced by an amended, student-centric, scaffolded approach which combined unfamiliar TEL-tools such as Screencasting with a novel teamwork protocol known as the Jigsaw Strategy. Form temporary “expert groups” by having one student from each jigsaw group join other students assigned to the same segment. This teamwork strategy forms temporary “expert groups” by having one student from each Project Team join other students assigned to the same role. (Aronson et al. 1978, 2011).
For a team-project in Product Design, the student challenge was to deliver a complete design project, including historically “ignored” roles eg Marketing, Quality. Feedback during the semester was provided as a combination of f2f and recorded oral, to improve student interaction levels (West et al. 2011). We will present our experiences using technology to support the Jigsaw Strategy for a team-project in Product Design, along with student feedback. If necessary students could create separate presentation pieces which would then need to be collated into one unit.
This approach delivered a scaffolded learning experience for all participants, regardless of individual roles within the teams. The impact on the strategic and structural development of both the product and the project was demonstrably better than historical renditions of the same experience. As a result, student reflections at the end of these projects suggested that they found the experience to be more empowering, participation by all team members more enhanced, problem solving to be more systematic and successful and that their understanding of a more expansive product design process to be mindfully more holistic. In addition, it might be suggested that the advancement of their teamworking and conflict-resolution skills would allow for a more positive transition from academia into industry.
Topics: Continuing Professional Development , Topics: Students as Partners
