When Our Powers Combine: Design Thinking Practices for Learning, Graphic, and Multimedia Design Teams Creating Courses
Concurrent Session 10
Brief Abstract
To effectively communicate to students via online learning platforms, how does a department with instructional, graphic, and multimedia designers collaborate to deliver a cohesive design and messaging? In this workshop and discussion, you will take away design thinking strategies and documents that support cross-team course designs.
Presenters
Extended Abstract
The Topic and Its Relevancy
With the pressure to produce online courses in a short timeframe, especially during the pandemic, instructional design (ID) departments have turned to design thinking as a model to guide their production (Zeivots et al., 2021). According to the Stanford d.school, this design thinking requires its practitioners to empathize with the users, define core problems, ideate solutions, prototype, and test (Wrigley & Straker, 2017). Although objectively the process seems to be simple enough, multi-level intricacies emerge when multiple projects and various design teams are attempting to follow the process at the same time within a short turnaround.
So how can design thinking be practiced in ID departments? In attempts to overcome the challenges and to produce quality online courses without depending purely on the skill of instructional designers, the presenters’ department consists of three sub-departments: learning design, graphic and web design, and multimedia. Their combined efforts follow a multi-step, collaborative multimedia process that uses modified design thinking process to create and build learning experiences that enrich the student and faculty experience.
The first key component of the design thinking process is seeking input and feedback from clients in order to determine the desired motivations and come up with a targeted outcome. The learning designers (LDs) directly work with instructors, and immediately in their production kickoff meetings discuss the vision for a course, student feedback, challenges, and benefits related to the course (meeting agenda to be shared in the workshop). After the initial meeting, the LDs complete a concepting document created by the graphic design team to capture what the instructors and LDs envision for the student experience (concepting document to be shared in the workshop). During this stage, the LDs shoulder the first two steps of design thinking through their empathy and problem-solving with the instructors. They begin to share solutions to any learning challenges.
In the next stage, the graphic designers (GDs) examine the concepting document and begin mocking up small, low-risk designs and sharing color palette ideas to obtain feedback quickly. The design thinking process here is modified in that ideating and prototyping are combined. The GDs provide solutions (e.g., creating designs that help students navigate and prioritize assignments), and once their initial solutions are shared, this triggers the collaboration of cross-functional teams. The LDs return to the conversation to tweak the designs, while the motion graphics designers (MGDs), i.e., videographer, video editors, multimedia specialists, take the designs from the GDs and begin ideating and prototyping the video designs and any other multimedia assets needed for the course. The three sub-teams work together to discover design problems and evaluate prototypes and mockups to complete a finalized design package, including a customized PowerPoint template, templates pages and assignments for the learning management system Canvas, and studio and video editing guides.
The last step of the design thinking process is modified as well so that the testing of the design is completed by the LDs and the instructors during the production process, but the students do not test the design until the pilot of the course. Their feedback is collected in course surveys, which influence the next iteration of the course.
Plan for Interactivity during the Session
It is highly recommended you bring your own device. The interaction for this workshop will be realized through:
· A brief presentation and discussion (20 minutes)
· A small group walk-through (45 minutes; documents will be shared)
o A kickoff meeting following the established kickoff meeting agenda
o A kickoff follow-up activity to complete a concepting document
· Collaborative execution of ideas from the concepting document (25 minutes)
Takeaways for Audience: Collaboration Techniques for Learning, Visual, and Motion Designers
To effectively communicate to students via online learning platforms, designers of all disciplines first must develop a deep understanding of with whom and what we are communicating. The final product of this understanding is demonstrated through collaborations with learning, visual and motion designers. But how do all the disciplines collaborate to deliver a cohesive design? In this workshop and discussion, you will discover how instructional designers, graphic designers, web designers, videographers, animators, and editors gel together page to develop highly-interactive online courses.
You will develop a collaborative approach to design ideation, discovery, and prototyping to develop interactive multimedia assets. In the discussion, you will see how the many different teams come together to enrich the many touchpoints students experience from concepting ideas to building robust review systems and approvals. Through this solid ideation and design process, a team of learning designers, multimedia specialists, and graphic designers come together to build experiences that allow students to get excited about the learning process.
References
Wrigley, C., & Straker, K. (2017). Design thinking pedagogy: The educational design ladder. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 54(4), 374-385.
Zeivots, S., Vallis, C., Raffaele, C., & Luca, E. J. (2021). Approaching design thinking online: Critical reflections in higher education. Issues in Educational Research, 31(4), 1351-1366.