In the field of user experience (UX), there is a wide range of skills that practitioners are expected to acquire and demonstrate as a competitive candidate for a job. Previous research identified three main skill categories of UX practitioners: technical skills, human skills, and dispositions. However, as educators, we have found that students…

This paper is a systematic literature review of works focused on user-centred design practices and their potential application in pedagogical contexts in design and technology (D&T) education. It is a response to the increasingly complex demand of allowing students to develop so-called 21st-century skills within a D&T curriculum, which is…

This article presents a design-based research (DBR) methodology to develop a teacher professional development intervention that is aimed at helping teachers become designers of student-centred e-learning activities. The intervention was tested at Gulu University (GU) and Maseno University (MU), and a set of activities and tools, as well as six…

Threshold concept models offer a useful way of understanding aspects of design education. A threshold concept represents a gateway, or portal, to a more developed understanding and level of capability (Meyer, Land & Davies, 2008). Passing through a threshold can be transformative, irreversible, integrative and troublesome. Key transformations…

The aim of design education is that students learn to think and act like designers. However, the focus in the design studio is mainly on the design product, whereas the 'why and how' of the design process are barely addressed. A risk of learning by performing real-life tasks without addressing the skills involved, that is, without receiving…

According to UNESCO (2012) pedagogies associated with Educations for Sustainable Development (ESD) should spur and inspire students to think critically, ask questions and reflect. The assumption is, that pedagogies are moving towards student-centred participatory learning. Still, the educator is at the core of the transition towards developing…

This socioculturally informed study aims to apply learning by collaborative designing (LCD) as an instructional model for the creation and studying of new kinds of connected learning systems in teacher education. A case study was organized at the University of Eastern Finland in the context of an information and communication technology (ICT)…

This paper explores ways in which data collected during designerly activity in a Secondary Design and Technology Classroom in the UK, can be analysed with a view to ascertaining the features of the classroom interactions which facilitate the development of designerly activity in "fledgling designers" (Trebell, 2007). The paper builds…

Design is a discipline which involves many domains, skills and professions. Design practice in Technology education in the Irish second level (high school) context is not a representation of the professional realm of design. Design education in the Irish second level system is generally structured on a linear design process and associated…