Teaching design

Future designers have an important role to play in devising, developing and redeveloping a built environment that is circular, inclusive and resilient, can deal with climate change and contributes to the health of users. To achieve this, new digital resources are becoming available, including big data, AI, GIS, BIM and VR/AR. The question is how these innovations can be effectively integrated in the teaching of design.

But the challenges in the teaching of design are not only technological, social and spatial: they also involve didactics and teaching methods. More than ever before, society needs self-motivated, responsible and enterprising design professionals. Students need to learn how to approach poorly-formulated design tasks, a surfeit of data and a huge variety of actors in a construction sector that must improve its sustainability at an even faster pace.

Self-leadership, entrepreneurial spirit and a strong moral compass are key factors in this. Students need to learn how to adopt a professional attitude in a society that is not (yet) sustainable. But how do you tailor your learning objectives, learning environments and teaching methods to deal with that complexity and uncertainty? And how do you enable students to evaluate the spatial strategies they develop?

Key projects

  • PhD research by Elise van Dooren – Anchoring the design process. BK promotoren: Prof. Thijs Asselbergs en Prof.dr.ir. Machiel van Dorst. Niet-BK promotoren: Prof.dr. Jeroen van Merriënboer, Prof.dr. Els Boshuizen.
  • Martijn Stellingwerff – TU Delft Education Fellowship 2019-2020: VR/AR in Architecture Design Education.
  • Project Design pedagogies for MSc AUBS studio teaching by Roberto Cavallo and Willemijn Wilms Floet, sponsored by the 4TU Centre for Engineering Education.
  • Train-the-trainer courses Design Didactics I and II and Assessing in Design Education for TU design mentors, in which the teachers acquire basic and more advanced knowledge and skills in the field of teaching design. The courses have been developed by Elise van Dooren and Luc Willekens.
  • EUrbanism - Kristel Aalbers and Remon Rooij exchange with BauHOW5 universities on Urbanism pedagogies in schools of Architecture.

Key publications