1. Evaluation of patterns contents in various cultural contexts:
Design patterns identified in certain professional and cultural context might have a broader validity. Therefore, discussants will comment on solutions proposed in the wiki based on their own experience. The members will examine existing solutions to supporting cross-cultural collaboration and their own observations under the following perspectives:
- Are problems and solutions to support distance design education stated in the wiki pages unique/specific for design learning environments and for particular cultural contexts?
Nicole: I have observed these particular design patterns in Hong Kong Korean, Hong Kong Taiwanese and Hong Kong Austrian contexts. In the analysis of Hong Kong Korean teams, the validity of some patterns such as ANNOTATED DESIGN GALLERY, WHO WHEN WHAT, GRAND FINALE could be extended to other intercultural collaboration contexts such as Hong Kong Taiwan or Hong Kong Austria. However, patterns such as COMMUNITY WATCH or INTERNATIONAL HOME were only used by Hong Kong Korean teams.
Some patterns might be only useful in design learning environments, such as LOCAL VARIATIONS or GLOBAL RESOLUTION. However, there are patterns in this collection that I have seen being used in non-educational environments such as GRAND OPENING or SUMMING UP.
Effie: In our project iCamp (http://www.icamp-project.eu/) where different European Higher Education Institutions were involved. Students have collaborated entirely online in groups of 7 to 8 students to complete a project on designing an e-learning course under the supervision of a remote facilitator. Due to the financial constraints and organizational difficulties, we could not afford a grand opening where more than 70 students could have met face-to-face. Instead, they could only know each other in the beginning phase through a personal blog, written and/or with photos or even videos. Anyway, the drop out of the students turned out to be relatively high, for instance, in some groups 4 students dropped out, and some groups as high as 6. One of the potential causes for this disappointedly high drop out face can be attributed to the lack of such a grand opening where the students could feel somehow obliged to collaborate or contribute to the group work when their identities/roles can explicitly be recognized. I tend to support Nicole's view that it is necessary and useful to have a grand opening, especially for an entirelly online CSCL setting.
- Are there other aspects of culture that need more attention in differentiating the validity of patterns such as educational background, age, or language barriers?
Nicole: I believe that national culture does play a role in choosing appropriate collaborative learning environments. However, professional background and level of expertise in the area of assignment might also play a role in what kind and level of support students need. I have witnessed a synchronous learning situation where the patterns STRUCTURED CHAT and SUMMING UP were used in a team of all UK students and tutors. The reasons for using these solution were complexity of the task given and novelty of the medium used for collaboration. Students felt overwhelmed. In order to simplify the task tutors guided synchronous collaborative design sessions using the patterns STRUCTURED CHAT and SUMMING UP.
- If not, in which cultural and professional contexts could these problems and solutions also be observed?
- Are there other observations of cross-cultural collaboration and/or design education across national/political and geographical boundaries that should be added to the wiki?
Comments (6)
Anonymous said
at 11:55 am on Oct 3, 2008
Jane Osmond testing comment section
GLIDE08 visitor said
at 8:18 am on Oct 21, 2008
Are problems and solutions to support distance design education stated in the wiki pages unique/specific for design learning environments and for particular cultural contexts?
I interpret the list of 11 categories (see right) as describing an overall 'bonding' process for international participants coupled with support to facilitate an ‘emotionally-fostered’ bond throughout the process so all participants have a vested interest in continuing the collaboration to a successful conclusion.
But, whether the problems and solutions are particular to design learning environments? Hmmm - the bonding process is certainly more important than in disciplines outside Design: for example, in relation to the competitive nature of design (at least the Western version of design teaching and learning) if you have students who are used to operating as individuals in competition with each other, then a concentrated effort to get them to work as a team is a must.
Cultural contexts? Yes, again I think - because cultural contexts are different, therefore a cohesive overview of a project is essential. Differences would need picking up very early on - for example on a recent trip an educational institution in Hong Kong, I found that the teaching and learning style was very different to ours at Coventry University - the Hong Kong students were very used to working in a group, but our students don't really begin to bond until their third year - even then, they are encouraged to remain 'individual'. This could cause a problem in a cross-cultural project that would need addressing if the project was to be successful.
GLIDE08 visitor said
at 8:19 am on Oct 21, 2008
The above comment was contributed by Jane Osmond, Coventry University, England
GLIDE08 visitor said
at 8:22 am on Oct 21, 2008
To answer the question ‘If not, in which cultural and professional contexts could these problems and solutions also be observed?
Although I have answered yes to the question above, I do think that this method of working is applicable across disciplines and professions if successful collaborations are to take place - whether they are international/national/local. Again, for me it is about the participants feeling supported both practically and emotionally.
Jane Osmond
n.schadewitz@... said
at 3:06 pm on Oct 22, 2008
Jane, I like your comparison of learning and teaching approaches in Hong Kong and Coventry. In fact, some hypotheses such as LOCAL CORNER address the need of cultures with a strong individuality to feel comfortable and emotionally supported in a cross-cultural collaboration environment.
GLIDE08 visitor said
at 4:19 pm on Oct 22, 2008
Hi Nicole, Yes LOCAL CORNER would fill this need. Some recent work I have been involved with concerned international students' perception of group work, and one of the problems they had was misunderstanding colloquialisms. Also, one international transport and product design student from India talked about the assumption that all the students had extensive knowledge in relation to models/brand of (western) cars caused him some difficulty at the beginning of his course. On a very simple level, being able to explore and check for (mis)understanding at a local level before going 'public' I think would be a good idea.
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