Posted by: Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum
9/21/2007 10:33:49 AM


Title: The Voices of Voting: How Do We Judge Design?
Grade Level: High School
Subject Area: Arts
Language Arts
Social Studies
Lesson Time: One to two fifty-minute class periods
Introduction: There are a multitude of ways to judge design, from the personal to the global. The People’ s Design Award, which is hosted each year by Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum and sponsored by Target, gives the general public an opportunity to nominate and vote for their favorite designs. In this lesson students will investigate the diverse parameters of the voting process, and critically examine how design is judged.
Standards:
Reading
Standard 7. Uses reading skills and strategies to understand and interpret a variety of informational texts

Level III. 1. Uses reading skills and strategies to understand a variety of informational texts (e. g. , electronic texts; textbooks; biographical sketches; directions; essays; primary source historical documents, including letters and diaries; print media, including editorials, news stories, periodicals, and magazines; consumer, workplace, and public documents, including catalogs, technical directions, procedures, and bus routes)

Writing
Standard 1. Uses the general skills and strategies of the writing process

Level III.   5. Uses content, style, and structure (e. g. , formal or informal language, genre, organization) appropriate for specific audiences (e. g. , public, private) and purposes (e. g. , to entertain, to influence, to inform)

Arts and Communication
Standard 3. Uses critical and creative thinking in various arts and communication settings
Working With Others
Standard 1. Contributes to the overall effort of a group
History
Standard 2. Understands the historical perspective
Objectives:

Students will:

  • conduct research on varied systems of voting
  • create a graphic organizer
  • participate in small-group and large-group discussion
  • analyze, summarize, critique and evaluate information from varied sources
  • write a comparison paragraph
  • create a presentation
Resources:
  • “ Get out the Vote for Design” handout
  • Internet websites
Materials:
  • Computer with Internet access
Vocabulary: Students in this age group should be familiar with all words used.
Procedures:

Building Background

Diverse Votes The purpose of this activity is to encourage students to think about how different elements in popular culture are judged.   1. As a class, visit the Web site of the popular television show American Idol , which invites viewers to cast votes for their favorite performers during the course of the program’ s five-month season: https://www. americanidol. com/. Ask your students if they are familiar with, or have participated in, the voting process for American Idol . On this program, contestants pass through an audition process, and then, when they are on the actual program, their singing performances are critiqued by a panel of three judges. The viewing public votes each week, and the performer with the lowest number of votes leaves the competition.

2. Ask the students to compare how the performers are judged at the auditions and how the performers are judged during the program television season.

3. Invite students to share their thoughts and opinions on whether or not the voting process on American Idol is an effective way to judge singing.

Steps for Learning

Compare & Contrast The purpose of this activity is for students to analyze a variety of judging systems.

1. Divide the class into small groups. Give each group a copy of the “ Get Out the Vote for Design” handout (attached). One component of the handout is the creation of a graphic organizer. A graphic organizer is a visuo-spatial representation of information. If your students are not familiar with graphic organizers, you can visit the Read. Write. Think Web site at https://interactives. mped. org/view_interactive. aspx?id=127& title . This Web site contains an interactive tool to create graphic organizers. 2. Allow time for each group to work on the handout and prepare their presentation.

3. Provide time for each group to share its presentation. Lead a class discussion based on students’ reactions to the presentations.
Assessment:

You may assess the students’ work according to the following categories using a scale of 1-5.

  • Research
  • Graphic Organizer
  • Paragraph
  • Understanding of Varied Voting Systems
  • Collaborative Skills
  • Presentation
A score of 1=Needs Improvement A score of 2=Adequate A score of 3=Good A score of 4=Excellent A score of 5=Outstanding
Enrichment
Extension Activities:
Design Research
Have students conduct further research on how different design disciplines such as architecture, interior design, lighting design, fashion design, and landscape design are judged. Ask the students to share what they learn with their classmates.
Teacher Reflection: N/A.
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