WHAT is it?

Students design a character for another student and improve the design in response to feedback.

WHY teach it?

Students can learn empathy through designing for another person. They can also learn about themselves through the eyes of another. An important part of the experience is for students to view criticism as an opportunity to improve, and to develop the habit of dealing with peer critique. Learning through failure

HOW to do it?

▸ Introduction (5 mins)

▸ Choosing genre (10 mins)

Student A decides which genre of character they want to design for their partner (Student B*) (e.g., game, animation, TV series) and then decides on the sub-genre (e.g., fantasy, sports, romance).

*As this is a mutual design task, each student plays the roles of Student A and Student B at the same time.

▸ Building the character profile (20 mins)

Students fill in the character profile form.

▸ Drawing/building the character #1 (25 mins)

You can ask the students to create images of their characters by drawing them or doing collage with images cut from old magazines.
Students are encouraged to cut out the characters to change the gesture.

▸ Peer evaluation (20 mins)

Student B evaluates the character created for them with the help of the character patch card.

▸ Drawing/building the character #2 (60 mins)

Student A incorporates the feedback from Student B to redesign the character.

As the facilitator, you could consider ‘upgrading’ the format of the presentation for this second iteration (e.g., if the character was initially drawn, then it could now be constructed via collage or even 3D modeling).

▸ Presentation and debriefing (20 mins)