Inverting Critique: Emergent Technologically Mediated Critique Practices of Developing Design Students

• In Event: Examining Design Education and Lifelong Learning

Abstract

Critique is the primary method of assessment used in design education, yet is not well understood apart from traditional structures of institutional power and faculty initiation. In this study, we analyze the classroom presentations and critiques of eleven teams in a design-focused human-computer interaction graduate program, focusing on an emergent instructional design for technologically-mediated critique created by experienced students serving as peer mentors. Initial analysis suggests complex interaction between multiple modes of critique beyond the “traditional” critique: 1) public oral critique led by faculty, 2) a critique document authored in Google Docs by experienced students, and 3) backchannel chat in Google Docs by experienced students. These interactions indicate instructional affordances for including many simultaneous users within an existing critique infrastructure.

Authors

• Colin M. Gray, Purdue University

• Craig D. Howard, The University of Tennessee - Knoxville