Systems Design Project : Cities for Children
By Mridu, Indrayudh Binayak & Subhrajit
Initial steps We started out with Architecture and Psychology as the broad topic and then looked into what effects these two factors have on people.
Initial research : At the very beginning, mental health and productivity were two areas we had researched about. While researching these areas and mapping out the stakeholders, we realized that it is the children that were being most neglected. It is particularly relevant today because today, everything we do is for the future, so not including the future for the future, didn’t seem smart.
Cities Today : Around the world, governments are creating cities for the future ; Green cities, Smart cities and Resilient cities. For all the above to be achieved in the future; children need to be included simply to keep the system running and to carry if forward, so that even when people of the present are not in a position to keep it functional, it is sustained. However, this would only be possible if the children and youth of today feel a sense of ownership and responsibility, because it is only when one gets something, do they feel like giving back. This would also help shape and create better citizens, citizens of tomorrow.
Defining Smart : To narrow down the opportunities for the sake of beginning this project, fixing a context was necessary. We fixed Ahmedabad city as our context and started looking into India’s objectives and plans for a Smart City and how children can be included to play a significant role in the same.
Similar initiatives were being undertaken by people from around the world. One such case study is that of Ron Finley, who went around Los Angeles beautifying barren pieces of land through gardening. One important insight from this case study is that sometimes defying rigid structures and policies may just be for the better. The context is Ahmedabad and the focus group is the children, but getting across to the masses of children involved some research. As a team, we looked into the role of social media and how commercially today, social marketing works, the tips and tricks. This involved understanding the pyschology of the people and the importance to detail in terms of the jargon used. Empathy, and the need to get into the shoes of the child to really understand their needs and perspectives.
Why Empower and How : Empowering children is a solution to achieve the Cities For Children dream, but it would be futile unless it’s a 2 way process where in, not only are the children being sensitized but so are the citizens, because the citizens have to be accepting of the the children and there must be mutual respect and understanding. We could have always focused on adults, but the reason why children were picked is because ; a) The children are the future b) Learning is easier than unlearning and for an adult to change is more difficult.
As a part of the research and solution finding, taking into account current initiatives and analysing and interacting with them for possible collaborations was important. Sub Ka Bus was an aProch initiative suggesting the use of defunct buses to connect children and carry out co-creation activities on wheels. A similar synergy mapping was done after listing down and interacting with different advocators.
First Meeting This was the beginning of our collaboration with the Riverside school. We were not only the jurors at the Design For Change 2017, but also collaborated on aProch initiatives like Street Smart, Parents of the park and City on Cyles. Further we conducted Design Thinking workshops with an assortment of kids at the Riverside school. A tour and workshops were conducted at NID for them. A set of game cards have been designed that can be used by the teachers at the school as well as anyone else who intends to empower children through activities wherein children engage with their surroundings, their city.
Research As a part of the unfocussed research, experiencing and observing children and their natural behaviour and interaction with their surroundings, reading case studies from around the world, preparing surveys & conducting interviews was crucial. We interacted with the Diwan Ballubhai school,Mandvini pole,The Riverside school, children from the Mirzapur slums ,at Parimal garden, NGO’s and children from military schools, Mahatma Gandhi International School and specially abled children of Apang Manav Mandal to gain deeper insights.
Primary Research
As a part of our research, we visited Mandvi ni pol in the Old City part of Ahmedabad. Like any other pols in Ahmedabad, it had clusters of houses comprising of families that have been living there for over centuries together. As we walked through the meandering lanes, we could see people peeping out of the iron-rimmed balconies, setting up their shops for the evening market, children returning from schools in heavily packed auto-rickshaws, celebrating their reunion with their family after a long day at school. Our motive was to conduct a short interview with the school going children residing there and their respective parents or guardians. The small kids described their locality not only in terms of festive times and playful moments but also with gossips about the recent incidents, local myths and legends. The old ladies talked about the glorious past times when there were a fewer number of shops and vehicles while the parents added that this created lack of space for the children to play. The parents also emphasized on the fact that nowadays due to the study stress, children shuffle between school and tuition classes leaving very little time for them to play.
Research, Analysis & Validation 1 : City on Cycles City on cycles is an aProch initiative that takes place on specific weekends along the Riverfront. The objective of this event is to give children a chance to connect with the city. However, this is lost due to safety concerns while handling large groups on the chaotic streets of Ahmedabad. There is a tie up with MyBike, a bike rental service, that rents cycles for free to anyone attending the event. As a result of heavy traffic and poor road conditions, children are restricted from exploring the city on wheels, and instead cycle on a safe and limiting path along one part of the river.
Street Smart
This is another aProch initiative wherein the Law garden road is blocked off for 2 hours on some sundays and the children are given a chance to take over the streets by involving themselves in activities organised for them. Activities like colouring, temporary tattoos, pottery, road races and many other fun games are organised for children. Attending this event stirred thoughts on the concept of Street Smart and what it’s all about. Different ways of defining and redefining street “smart’ became topics of discussion, which further led to the question of, what is smart about it and if the children were actually taking over the street. Topics of dependancy, childrens’ interests and logisitcs were looked into too. Children from various backgrouds attend this event but there is a lack of interaction among them. Basic questions concerning children traveling from across the city adds to the traffic and is inconvenient, so how can any street be converted into a ‘Street Smart’?
We witnessed the first example of co-creation and workshops for children. This was a part of our research and validation. Ideas of converting this system into a sustainable system wherein children don’t have to be dependant on adults, wherein they decide how,when,where what happens, converting any road into a ‘street smart’ and it’s implications, peer learning redefinign smartness, concepts of street smat and confidence and more. The basic objective of this was how does a child become empowered to take on anything of interest or concern to them.
Below is a critical analysis of the event. To begin with, Street Smart is attended by children of all age groups, but the activities didn’t cater to all age groups. Slightly older children were bored and walked away quickly. The lack of waste management at the event. Naturally, food vendors line up along the street, Law garden being a famous shopping and recreation spot in the city. Ideas of directing activities towards creating awarness and an effecient waste disposal system surfaced. The large number of people results in children getting lost in the crowd. There is a lack of interaction among the children who attend the event. Since the event requires volunteers, the hpressing demands of children leads to frustration and exhaustion. The idea of events by the children, with the children and for the children stood out strong.
Initial Direction
Initial Direction
Research Methods
Most of the younger children picked (4) as their most desired habitat while slightly older children picked (2) as their most desired habitat.
There were varied suggestions from children. While some focussed on safety and emergency issues (shields and bodyguards), some focussed on recreation and entertainment (swings and gardens), others created their own world of fantasy that includes butterflies, cool gadgets, chocolates and other fun things.
A list of surveys was carried out across different ages of children. Questions relating to empowerment were directly and indirectly asked. On analysing their replies, more than 80% of children want to be involved in decision making. From the answers, the children seem to be level headed,sensible and displayed respect for adults. They complained about issues with being ‘treated like a child’and stated burden of responsibility, boredom and stagnation as reasons for not wanting to be an adult. They also did mention being excluded from family decision making and expressed their keeness in being included in it.
Amusement park, roller coasters, slides made by the younger ones. Afforestation, less pollution, football, cycle paths and sitting areas by the older ones. Fantasy sci-fi is liked by younger kids and peace and nature is preferred by older kids
An ideation phase where in games were designed keeping in mind 3 core values : with children, by children and for children. Games along the lines of research, validation, Design Thinking, empathy, interaction with & in the city, integration in the school cirriculum and enhancing learning beyond the four walls of the classroom were designed. Ensuring that all these activities are sensorial and hands on.
Contents of the cards : Name of the game Who What When Where How Time duration Players
Research and Validation 1
As promised to Riverside school, we invited students of classes 1 to 4 from the Riverside school to NID for an educational visit. It was a warm and sunny Saturday, perfect for a lazy afternoon spent under the shade of a tree (perhaps a scenery, a tad too idyllic for a city like Ahmedabad). So, we took this opportunity to conduct a series of workshops simultaneously while the kids were going through the streets and corridors of NID. But the students were all pumped up and enthusiastic, ready to have a great time although they didn’t have any idea about the fun activities we had arranged for them. The intention behind these workshops were to gather deeper insights about what kids mostly relate to from their immediate surroundings and the city in general and what they prioritize and remember from the loads of information around them or provided to them daily.
Roz Ka Rasta
This is a research activity with the objective to understand the hierarchy of importance of places in the city. Through mental and physical mapping children reflect on their personal lives as well as develop sensory and spatial understanding. A stark difference was seen in the outcome by street kids and private school kids. The children of lower economic backgrounds showed a deeper understanding and reflected with greater ease due to highter interaction and involvement with the city when compared to children from higher economic groups. They were also more specific while tagging as they were well versed with the names of places and streets in the city.
Mapping Activity Many children built the spaces in and around their homes and sky scrapers resulting from wishful thinking. Individually each of them mapped their own route and soon realized that they’d created a miniature city and were pleasantly suprised by the power of co - creation. The level of autonomy with thich they built varied across different age groups and categories of children. This is a mindmap of the outcomes from the first time this activity was conducted.
Knock Knock What’s There Children were handed images of six different buildings and were asked to draw whatever they thought would be happening inside those buildings. We were awestruck to see the heavy downpour of wonderful ideas and imaginary elements on the posters and the interesting part was to notice that a lot of them didn’t have an apparent relation to the building in the poster in any manner. But then the extent of imagination differed from school to school and the children respectively.
Knock Knock What’s There This activity was conducted with the objective of collecting directed primary research. In addition to that it helps children express their creativity and thoughts which would be feedback and inspirtion for architects and city planners to build for the fututre,with the future. Besides this, it also makes children reflect, observe and draw associations with their everyday surroundings.
The children from Apang Manav faced a lot of starting trouble, they were unable to relate to objects of luxury. Interestingly, they expressed thoughts of safety, destruction and had a fair understanding of their surroundings. They mostly drew people and things in clusters and gew out of the initial hesitation.
This activity was conducted with different sets of children including Apang Manav (specially abled), Right To Education group from the Riverside school, Diwan Ballubhai School (Municipal school), NGO kids and other mixed groups at parks.
They found this building to be the most playful. The organic structure was looked at as gigantic slides of a school. Their were ideas of heirarchy, emergency exits and luxury cars displayed by the RTE children between the ages of 6 and 9 years from the Riverside school.
We observed a notable difference in the level of freedom with which chidren drew across different age groups and categories. Below grade 3, children are more free and not afraid to make mistakes. Older kids are hesitant and more easily influenced by the examples given to them.
Themes of safety, destruction, teamwork & co-creation,nature and associations to activities at school were observed.Elements like swimming pools, daaru jhopdi, stilt falling house, hierarchy, luxury products were some notable observations from the drawings. The theme of Nature and it’s elements, was constant across all children.
Here is a synopsis of themes that emerged from the workshop done with the RTE children of Riverside school. Every building had an emergency exit, and this became a point of concern. However, the teachers confirmed that the children were reflecting on what they were being taught at school. Hence, this activity was not only a chance for the children to self reflect but a validation for the teacher and their education module. One section of a building was tagged, ‘open to discussion’, which shows that children believe and appreciate the views and opinions of each other.
Activity Insights A notable difference was seen in the level of freedom with which children drew. Children of a younger age were more free while expressing their opinions and thoughts. Older kids needed an initial direction in the form of examples. They were easily influenced, and many a times found it difficult to waver from it.
‘In and Around’. For this activity the kids were provided with clay, popsicles, cardboards, pebbles and other natural or waste materials and were asked them to make the place in or around there home which was closest to their heart.The children made what was closest to their heart ( objects and spaces ), structures and models which were, more often than not, nowhere close to what we had asked them to do but were amazing in terms of the thought that they had put to make them. They had made an indoor anthill house for guest ants, ice-cream stalls and feather trees to name a few. Themes of home, family. personal belongings, nature and social interaction surfaced. One strong expression was that of empathy for ants wherein one child build an anthill inside her own house so that the ants can live safely.
Synopsis and analysis of the outcomes
Design For Change This was the biggest validation in our journey. More than 2000 stories of empowerment and change poured in from all over the country. Children followed a basic framework of Feel, Imagine, Do and Share to find solutions to the problems they face. This translation of the design process into an universally comprehendable framework worked wonders. The nobility and perks of peer learning despite the ironic cut throat competition seen in children today was one of the greatest highlights of the event. The power in the hands of the children to bring about a change is often underestimated, all they need is a chance. Children were solving issues like traffic congestion, gender discrimination,water pollution, sanitation and a lot more.
Breaking down the Design Thinking process into activities through gamification.
Mapping the different stakeholders and the levels of impact their actions have on children.
Generating several ideas in different directions. Putting forth voices of children, Including them in decision making, our own street smart were some of the chosen paths.
Research database of collaboraters, surveys and questionnaires, interviews and initial activities and games.
Postcards To The PM
Across various schools, age groups, children of classes 2 and 7 were asked to write a postcard to the prime minister, Narendra Modi, listing down their likes, dislike and aspects of wishful thinking relating to Ahmedabad city - They appreciated Swacch Bharat, Heritage city, mission, bullet trains and metros, nature, places of leisure & people of the city. They complained about issues of spitting, pollution, corruption, traffic and safety etc. Extremely personal and specific stories of everyday experiences also surfaced. It reflected the sensitivity of the children. The areas of concern mentioned by the children were very similar to what we as adults agree to and have made a part of our improvement goals. This goes to show that they aren’t as immature as we take them to be.Then what’s the difference if the children aren’t included? Inclusivity will develop a sense of ownership, inspiration, making them better more responsible citizens, helping build a future where they are empowered and their opinions matter.
Dream Team : A workshop was conducted on the 14th of November, 2017, Children’s Day. A mixed group of people living on campus were invited to attend this event. Children, their parents, members of the administration were all seated in a semi circular fashion. This was our second round of user testing where in this co-creational setup allowed for healthy discussions concerning current issues on campus.Every individual’s opinion was taken into consideration, regardless of the age. Empathy activities that involved the parents to argue from their child’s point of view and vice versa, on the topic of permission to get a phone was held. and both parties for the first time, empathized with each other and were able to respect the other’s feelings better.
Design Thinking
Empower
A workshop to empower children to conduct their own workshops for other children using the tools of design thinking. Children of the age group 9 - 12 from NGOs, a Cantonment school, municipal schools and Riverside participated in these workshops.
Empower
Opportunity mapping and Ideation circles ; These activities were conducted without using design jargon, rather by playing games like football, using the ball as a metaphor for everyday problems. All the suggestions and solutions came from the children. A workshop wherein we as designers played the role of facilitators and curators, and the children empowered themselves to carry on the workshop end to end, till implementation at a live event. The workshop included both individual and group tasks and was discussion and debate heavy.
Design thinking through gamification and activities : Opportunity mapping and ideation through co-creation tasks were executed and validated at Parimal Garden on successive sunday mornings. This workshop for workshop is a step ahead of DFC, wherein the aim was to remove the adult from the picture and completely empower those children who want their voices to be heard, to the extent wherein they get to conduct the entire event by themselves. Something that informs Something that provokes Something that shows The workshop aimed to empower children to take matters into their own hands to a level at which children empower children thereby removing the ‘adult’ from the picture. Such a system would be sustainable and inculcate a sense of ownership and responsibility.
Step Forward
Students readily took forward their ideas and implemented it with enthusiasm. Good co-creation would involve activities which include introverts as well. At parimal garden, the children re-organised themselves into groups. While one group gathered children form the park to participate in their activity, another group dealt with the logisitics. Their idea for the workshop was to organize a competition wherein children create something meaningful from the waste around them. The children were smart and collaborated with the food sellors and cleaners of the park to collect enough waste for the activity.
Future To take this project a step further, collaborations with the following organizations will be looked into ; Unicef foundation, Nepal Cities For Children Bernard Van Leer Foundation aProCh - The Riverside school Milan Symposium - Shapring
Alternate Title A different way of putting across the objective of this project would be; To help children realize their rights ;The right to participate in any decision making that involves them directly or indirectly; leading to better, more responsible citizens and eventually creating Cities For Children.
https://issuu.com/subhrajitghosal/docs/22_tips_for_conducting_workshop_for 22 Tips on Interacting with Children - With Children. This reflects our learning as this is the result from our experiences;through our journey of being clueless about how to interact with children to being confident about the same.
https://issuu.com/subhrajitghosal/docs/knock_knock_-_whats_there A compilation of outcomes of Knock Knock What’s There - By Children. This activity was conducted multiple times to see the differences in outcomes and share these ideas with the actual designers of the buildings, acting as a source of inspiration and feedback, in order to build better cities.
A set of cards were designed, after carrying out and testing these activities with children. This is a tool kit to empower children by engaging them with their city in numerous ways. - For The Children The combination of the 2 books and these cards form a set along with the Giga map - For, By and With the Children.
Inspiration cards : Case studies from all over the world
www.scribbleonthesidewalk. wordpress.com
Mridu, Indrayudh Binayak & Subhrajit