Novice visual communication design students' awareness of design process

Abstract

This article reports the outcomes of an inquiry which set out to assist novice, first year visual communication design students to develop awareness of their design process. To facilitate this, a learning intervention was incorporated into the teaching structure. This took the form of a design process diary/journal which enabled students to track their design activities during a six-week assignment. The key component of the diary was the inclusion of a six-stage design process model devised by Swann in 2002. Findings suggest that many of the students found the model allowed them to develop a more explicit understanding of the stages they went through while designing and that their previous understanding of design process had been advanced through the use of the process model.