Context
In 2021, this designer contributed to an iteration of the nationwide initiative known as Playful Learning Landscapes as an education content developer. Through a series of neighborhood engagements, communities determined the overall goal of the design project.
Build young children’s social emotional and literacy skills by inspiring playful interactions with their caregivers in everyday places.
Challenge
In 2022, after concept development and schematic design phases were complete, the team was ready to conduct research activities with a key group of stakeholders from the neighborhood where these learning environments would be installed. Our goal was to better understand the context of caregivers’ everyday interactions with children.
Methodology
A partner organization in the Little Village neighborhood convened over 30 parent volunteers at their site.
After introducing the project goals and team members, we utilized the 1-2-4-All protocol from Liberating Structures. Starting with a simple prompt, this activity generated an abundance of questions, ideas, and suggestions from lived experience experts. This heuristic approach made room for reflection and prevented de facto groupthink.
Following small group discussions, stakeholders illustrated their ideas with chart paper and markers. Many groups mapped the location of their daily conversations with children, showing routes to and from school, shops, and family homes.
Sharing out to the whole group helped the team of designers surface insights and add nuance by observing the reactions–affirmations, amusement–of the presenting group’s peers in the room.
Results
The team synthesized findings by identifying key themes from the activity. Based on these themes, we drafted conversation prompts for a community photo album and collected representative images from community members and local photographers.
Insights
The design team had accomplished 90% schematic plans at the time of this community focus group. Rather than presenting options and asking stakeholders to evaluate pre-determined images and text, we listened deeply for the cultural and personal motivations behind their conversations with young children. This approach helped us create a community photo album that was truly reflective of this special place.