Talk Title:  Cooperative Inquiry: When Children and Adults Design Together

Speaker:  beth bonsignore, Associate Research Professor; Director, BA in Tech & Info Design; Director, KidsTeam

Location: HBK 2105 and Zoom

Abstract:  The goal of Participatory Design is to include as many people (users) as possible in all stages of the technology design process. Initially, it was unclear whether children could be actively involved in participatory design in any role beyond “end user” or “tester.” In 1998, KidsTeam was launched at UMD’s Human-Computer Interaction Lab to explore practical and ethical questions about co-design between children and adults. This research resulted in Cooperative Inquiry, a design-based research approach that is now in use internationally across academia and industry. Its participatory design practices and techniques have been incorporated into HCI curricula and integrated into design-based research in the Learning Sciences, with impacts on industry practice. KidsTeam has also expanded its reach, demonstrating its replicability, utility, and generalizability as similar intergenerational co-design capabilities have been created in university/K-12, not-for-profit, and industry settings.

More recently, new horizons for intergenerational co-design have opened up. For example, the Cooperative Inquiry design framework has become foundational in emerging critical design and computational empowerment programs. This raises interesting research questions about the role of youth in these new efforts. In this talk, Beth will provide a brief overview of KidsTeam at UMD: how it started, how it’s going, and how it might best meet these new challenges.

Bio:  Elizabeth (“beth”) Bonsignore is an associate research professor at UMD’s College of Information and Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL). Her research explores the design of interactive play and social experiences that promote new media literacies and arts-integrated science learning. She co-designs and advocates with youth, families, and local communities with the goal of empowering youth historically underrepresented in STEM to advance in these fields. Her recent collaborations with amazing graduate students have explored the challenges (and conundrum) of making participatory design as inclusive as possible through assets-based design and funds of identity.