This study is carried out within the context of a research and innovation
project Co-design with Kids that aims to support teaching of broad so-called ‘21st
century’ skills. In this project, design toolboxes for use within primary education
are developed and studied, with real life clients and assignments. In the case
described in this paper, the assignment was to create new concepts for physical
education (PE). To be able to assess the value of design outcomes created in a
co-design trajectory by children, we compared their design outcomes to those
created in a similar design process by professionals. Six teams of children (n=21,
11-12 years old) and three teams of professionals (n=10, with a background in
design, sports or physical education) developed concepts in separate co-creation
sessions. We present a first assessment of the differences and similarities in
creativity of the design outcomes of the two groups. This assessment of textual
summaries shows no remarkable differences between design outcomes of
children and those of professionals in terms of elaboration, originality and
relevance. This indicates that children could be involved as design partners.
Further research is needed to gain insight into the specific value of involving
children as design partners.@en

Today, it has been broadly acknowledged in the CCI community that children are not only active learners and users of technology, but can also actively participate in the design process. However, it remains challenging to analyze children's experiences and creative contributions resulting from co-design activities (e.g. stories, paper prototypes, enacted ideas). This workshop will explore different ways to analyze children's (0 to 18 years) experiences and contributions in co-design activities, the perceived benefits and challenges of these approaches, and will serve as a venue for synthesizing productive practices that will move the CCI community forward.

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This paper explores indicators of design fixation by following the development of the design ideas of a group of primary school children (age 10-12) carrying out a co-design project. Our goal is to find ways to improve the early mastering of DT (Diverging Thinking) and CT (Converging Thinking) skills, which in turn will help them to develop their creative abilities. The case study presented here indicates that the children showed adherence to the initial design idea and a lack of openness for divergent thinking at some points in the later stages of the design process, which led to little or no development of their design idea. Furthermore, we observed that the occurrence of design fixation in later stages of the design process has a negative influence on the creative development of the design idea. We grouped moments indicating design fixation into four categories that emerged from the data, which we named: “Band-aids”, “Already taken care of”, “Question not used for elaboration” and “It’s not possible”. We expect that these categories we found, which could be classified as indicators, will be helpful for a facilitator in identifying design fixation during the design process and adjusting the facilitation techniques accordingly. We expect these indicators to be present in sessions with students on different educational levels, which make these findings relevant to the education of future design professionals.@en

This dissertation investigates how users, and particularly children aged 8-12, can play an active role in research related activities in the design process. In participatory- and co-design, users participate increasingly early in the design process. When conducting user research in order to gain contextual knowledge about the lives, experiences and wishes of users, co-researchers can be of help in setting up, conducting research and analyzing the data. Eleven case studies are conducted to investigate if and how children are able to perform as co-researchers. Children conducted interviews with other participants, and in doing so increased their knowledge about people close to them and about themselves. Besides gaining valuable insights from their participants, the co-researchers accessed and shared their own experiences. So while listening to others, the children got sensitized themselves. In other words, next to gathering more data, “super-sources” are created when children become co-researchers. The research in this thesis has yielded: a theoretical model about involving children in design as researchers, descriptive case studies showing the set-up and conduction of co- research projects, a reflection on the added value of children as co-researchers and a list of guidelines for practitioners who want to use co-research.@en

Designers need to have an empathic understanding of their intended users if they are to design products that fit. This holds especially strong for elderly and children as user groups, because they are very different from the designer. However, it might be harder to obtain this information from children and elderly. This paper describes a research project that explored new approaches to involve children and elderly as a combined user group in the context of user involvement in product development. The research took place in a design setting; the development of an intergenerational movement park. We describe the role these two user groups played in the design process in order to develop new products that help them to be physically and socially active together. The process is examined on two aspects: the combination of the two user groups and the influence of the users on the project. We will discuss the methods used, the outcomes and give recommendations.@en