Climate action in Kenya: Designing a transformative children’s museum.
This webpage provided participant information on the workshop for Master students at the IDE faculty, which was held in September-November 2023. The workshop is over.
Q&A
Q: how can we enroll as a group?
A: Groups have three members. Enrollment through Brightspace can only be done individually; each member needs to do that, then one of the members sends an e-mail to m.a.gielen@tudelft.nl about your intention to form a group. You can find the course on Broghtspace in the Catalog, under “ID5541 – Workshop / Design Competitions (3ec) (2023-2024 Q1)“.
Q: can I also do this course individually?
A: No. If you enroll, you will be placed in a group – we expect groups of 3 students.
Q: what is the roster?
A: we are still preparing the course roster, see the overview in the Course Brochure for the weekly schedule. Expect to be busy on campus full Tuesdays in week 1.3-1.9. There may be some site visits outside this time frame.
Q: does this workshop involve travel?
A: the workshop is in The Netherlands and mainly takes place on our campus. Some local travel may be required, e.g. to a museum or play space.
Q: can I follow lectures without participating in the full course?
A: No. We strive to create an interactive learning format and to build a community during this workshop. We think that allowing extra audiences would disturb this process and have decided against it.
10-7-2023: Course Brochure provides more info
Please find all the information that is available at the moment in the course brochure following this link.
7-6-2023 location: Science Centre
The workshop series will take place at the Science Centre (near the Echo building on TU Delft Campus). This wonderful location has all the facilities we need (e.g. a dedicated workshop room for all Tuesdays), provides a nice break from our usual surroundings, and allows us to casually observe some of the children’s workshops.
17-5-2023 Introducing the team
The workshop is hosted by four lecturers from IDE, each with their specific expertise:
- Mathieu Gielen: design for children’s play and co-design with children
- Arnold Vermeeren: transformative museum experiences
- Annemiek van Boeijen: culture-sensitive design
- Deger Ozkaramanli: ethical dilemmas in design
Our partner in Kenya is Evy van Weezendonk, founder of Anzania, and her team. More local stakeholders will join.
15-5-2023 Introducing the workshop
This year you get the chance to participate in a special course in the form of a series of workshops (under the umbrella of the course ‘workshops/design contests ID5541’). The course counts for 3 ECs and runs in Q1.
Title of the course:
Climate action in Kenya: Designing a transformative children’s museum
Introduction
Climate change is the most pressing societal challenge of our times. How to motivate climate action through transformative museum experiences with and for children? This is the main question to be tackled in this course. Uniquely, you will be invited to help tackle this question in Kenya, East Africa. The coordinators of this course have already established a collaboration opportunity with a Kenyan Foundation (Anzania) that aims to create a museum / experience center to empower children (8-12 years old) to motivate climate action.
How Anzania describe themselves
In the Metropolitan area of Nairobi, Kenya, Anzania is planning and developing a museum / experience centre to engage young people with some of the most critical issues of our time. Anzania intends to become a place for young eco-changemakers to discover and embrace their transformative powers. Our mission is to educate, engage and empower children in environmental issues. Our exploratory gardens and interactive exhibits stimulate their natural curiosity and creativity.
The project is an initiative of Evy van Weezendonk, a Dutch national who lives and works in Nairobi, Kenya. The Anzania team consists of changemakers united by their passion for nature and concern for the environment. A team of creative people of all ages who have joined forces to work collaboratively towards empowering the youth in our ecological disaster. The museum will inspire and empower children to act for a greener Kenya and world, inspired by the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.
Course contents
In this course, you are invited to integrate four different perspectives and research lines:
– Transformative museum experiences (motivating and supporting attitude and behaviour change)
– Children’s play (handling tensions between free play and play as a means for learning)
– Culture-sensitive design (understanding and designing with cultural values and practices)
– Ethical issues and moral dilemmas in design (in this course, particularly from a decoloniality perspective)
The course will address questions such as:
– What is the meaning of a museum in an unfamiliar cultural context and over time?
– What is the role of play in transformative experiences?
– What are the values that are nurtured in raising and educating children?
– What might be the key enablers of long-term behaviour change in this specific culture?
The course offers a mix of articles/documentaries/podcasts and in-class activities (e.g. guest lectures, workshops, debates). We will facilitate discussions with stakeholders from both the Netherlands and Kenya to deepen our understanding of the local context, cultural values and practices. The design goal in the course will be to develop a creative design brief. This design brief will form your final deliverable and will include the following items:
- A vision on transformative design(s) for museums to support children in putting their learnings into daily life practice, supported by illustrative design ideas;
- Guidelines for designers who will design these transformative experiences;
- Existing examples of transformative designs that inspire the intended designers;
- Ethical questions and dilemmas that may need to be addressed by the intended designers;
- Relevant literature and other sources that will support the designers.
The workshop will be completed with a personal reflection (interactive, in a dialogue with other students and the teachers) on the offered theory and activities in the workshop.
The course is worth 3 ECs and involves working in groups from week 3 through week 9. The deliverables will be due week 10. Students can register individually or as teams.