"Design: Creation of Artifacts in Society"



Design: Creation of Artifacts in Society

From October to December 2012 (Moving from Hua Hin to Samui Hills, from Samui Hills down to the jungle...)

Design: Creation of Artifacts in Society” is the first course I chose to follow on Coursera. I highly recommend it if you have some interest in the subject. I joined to the Facebook page of the course and “met” a lot of peers in this course. I really enjoyed the interaction.



“Design and Artifacts in Society” is a practical course from Wharton, a branch of the University of Pennsylvania. Here is the link to the content of the teacher’s course (Prof. Karl T. Ulrich):
Professor Karl T. Ulrich is also an inventor and a entrepreneur.
For example, he designed and put the Xooter on the market:
  

You can visit his homepage…

 



Here is how the course is advertised:
"This is a course aimed at making you a better designer. The course marries theory and practice, as both are valuable in improving design performance. Lectures and readings will lay out the fundamental concepts that underpin design as a human activity. Weekly design challenges test your ability to apply those ideas to solve real problems. The course is deliberately broad - spanning all domains of design, including architecture, graphics, services, apparel, engineered goods, and products. The emphasis of the course is the basic design process: define, explore, select, and refine. You, the student, bring to the course your particular interests and expertise related to, for instance, engineering, furniture, fashion, architecture, or products. In prior sessions of the course about half of the participants were novices and about half had prior professional design expertise."

 My family and I moved two time in 8 weeks only during the time of this course. We were first settled in an apartment on the Beach in Hua Hin, Thailand. We, moved to a villa in the heights of BoPhut in Koh Samui, Thailand. From there, we moved one more time in a marginal house in the heart of  the island of Samui. I would take care of the children who I was homeschooling. Here was our program: breakfast, sport, swimming, teaching, lunch, free play for my kids and Coursera for me!


 
A little bit of gymnastics for me… And some homeschooling for my kids (the academic part of the teaching)

Swimming on Samui's heights. 

Ok, so let's go back to that great Coursera course!
We went quite in details into studying ice-cream scoopers. Yes! Ice-cream scoopers have a fascinating history, evolving in a Darwinian way!

        

See what I mean...

Tips to succeed in this class:

1. Details are important:

Before you start the course ask yourself those questions how am I going to present and submit my work for it to look good? I had a very old computer with an old version of photoshop, plus an Ipad to take pictures. So, can't say that this was very professional material... I knew the task would be challenging, because being able to present your work properly was part of the evaluation.
I lost 1 point in this class because of this challenging issue.... leaving me with a total grade of 99/100. I lost that point because I spend one day at the beach. On my way home, I stopped with my work at all the internet cafe I could see, but that day, I could not find any with a printer that was not out of service!! So instead of scanning my work for a neat rendering, I left the pic I had already uploaded just in case. I had taken a picture of a technical drawing with my Ipad and I had arranged it with Photoshop. I got one point removed because the definition was not of high enough quality.

2. How to pick up your project

a. Interest: Pick up a project you like
b. Realistic: Pick up a project you can complete in 8 weeks. Yes, it is nice to set the bar high, but it is also nice to know yourself and to present something neat at the end of the course.
c. Shareable:: I advise you, and I saw that the professor now also recommends (I signed up a second time for this course, just to see if there were additional information...): not to pick a project that you think will be your bread maker. pick up a project  that you will feel not comfortable sharing with others.

3. Interact with your peers:

 My interaction on Facebook with this class was awesome. I met great people there. We shared ideas and material. In some other classes, I felt forums where more fulfilling. Try different ways to interact with your peers and see... Today I even went back on the Facebook page and found 2 friends from the last course happily chatting with the new promotion and I joined in the conversation!!

4. Do your project as if you were going to launch it for real.

 And then, you might even launch it for real! Or at least, you will have learned so much from this project that at the end of the course you might be ready to create

5. Get into the competition!

 You will be offered the chance to participate to a competition... You might be asked to redesign the certificate, or design a t-shirt for the course... Or something similar. You can sent out as many project as you want. You don't have to get in, but come on! Missing that would be sad.
I gave a grade to every single entry... Crazy? Yes! But not the only one!

6. Have fun!


Some of my homework:
To give you an idea about my personal project:

We were asked to think about gaps in daily life… We had then to choose one of the gap and find solutions to close. The project had to be feasible in less than 8 weeks. Some people got stuck with their projects because it was hardly feasible in that short time.

I decided to solve the following problem:
How to visually divide space in a room?

I gave myself challenges in order to respond a well as possible to user needs. For example, my structure had to be light, easy to remove and store....

I only had my Ipad to take pics… Not the best tool for a class on design, but it was good enough to pass the course.

From my gap to closing my gap...

The following pictures only reflect part of my project. But it can give you an idea of what was expected and hopefully inspire you.
Copyright.






         


How did you find this page? Did you take this course and would like to share your experience? Would you like to share interesting links? Please do not hesitate to post your comments! Thanks!

         

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