Summary
In this teaching activity, the students will develop a short and insightful presentation, a so-called pitch, that underscores the importance of integrating more-than-human perspectives in design.
Motivation
More-than-human design is an emerging field. Designers who adopt more-than-human perspectives are often pioneers and may face questions about the limitations of human-centeredness. In such cases, having a concise and insightful pitch prepared can be more effective than a lengthy explanation, which might exceed people’s attention spans.
In this teaching activity, students will develop an elevator pitch that underscores the importance of integrating more-than-human perspectives in design processes and outcomes. The target audience could be fellow designers, design consultancies, clients, investors or other stakeholders interested in understanding the value of challenging the human-centered paradigm in technology design.
Learning outcomes
After the teaching activity students should be able to:
- Provide a short and insightful pitch explaining why more-than-human perspectives are important to address.
- Describe how more-than-human perspectives are incorporated in their design processes and outcomes.
- Perform a pitch in front of an audience.
Teacher guidance
Preparations
The students should have a project or case connected to more-than-human perspectives that they can pitch.
Step 1: Lecture, Group size: All, Time: 15 min
The teacher provides an introduction to the importance of communication and formulating arguments for why more-than-human perspectives are important to address. Guidelines for developing a pitch are introduced and the assignment that the students are to work on.
Step 2: Group work, Group size: 3-4, Time: 20 min
The students develop pitches.
Step 4: Share in class, Group size: All, Time: 15 min
The students pitch in front of the class and receive feedback from the teacher and peers.
Questions for assessment
- What were the main arguments addressed in your pitch?
- Why did you focus on these aspects of the more-than-human?
Recommended readings
Eriksson, Eva; Nilsson, Elisabet M.; Yoo, Daisy; and Bekker, Tilde (2024). More-than-Human Perspectives in Human-Computer Interaction Research: A Scoping Review. In Proceedings of the 13th Nordic Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (NordiCHI ’24). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 72, 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1145/3679318.3685408
