week 1. introduction

How this course goes:

1. 學生為主體的學習 (報告、討論、帶領工作坊、參與競賽)
    Students as learning subjects (report, discussion, workshop holding, competition)

2. 自主學習設計方法、設計工具、設計流程。
    self learning design methods, design tools, design process

3. 自行蒐集設計資料、定義問題、製作設計工具。
    self collecting data, framing problems, making design tool

4. 自行訂定設計評估方法，使用者調查方法。
    self designing evaluation methods, user study methods

學習內容:
What to learn:

1. 互動設計領域重要論文研讀 (Ubi-comp, Tangible interaction, Calm tech, / Slow tech, critical/reflective/ludic/speculative design, material interaction)

2. 互動設計研究方法學 (probology, research through design, / dialogical meaning-making, phenomenology)

3. 互動設計個案實作 (SIGCHI/DIS submission)

個人報告  (Sept. 14, /2026)
1. 自我介紹 (self-intro)
2. 惡趣味介紹 (complicated pleasure sharing)

3. 智慧型設計分享 (IOT examples) 九組擇一分享。(choose one category to share next week in classroom)

競賽相關

course outcomes targeting:

ACM CHI 2027 Student Research Competition

ACM CHI 2027 Posters Submission

1. 組隊 (2-5 人/隊) (2-5 students as a team)

2. 報告比賽規則, Q&A, discussion (Sept. 9, 2026)

期末: (final)

 組隊投稿 ACM 學生設計競賽/SIGCHI  Posters。
 Team up to participate ACM Student Research Competition or SIGCHI Posters.

ACM Student Research Competition: (Deadline Jan. 21, 2027)

https://chi2027.acm.org/authors/student-research-competition/

(only one author for graduate students)

ACM SIGCHI Posters: (Deadline Jan. 21, 2027)

https://chi2027.acm.org/authors/posters/

(one or multiple authors) 

Examples in the previous semesters:

Objects Gossip (CHI'26)

Wabi-Sabi ritual (CHI'26)

Dream Relay (CHI'25)

AI Cat Narrator (DIS'24)

Re.Dis.Cover Place with Generative AI (DIS'24)

Designing PhenoProbe (CHI'24) 

Experiential Persona (CHI'21)

Designing a Speculative Kit for Technology Imagination with Makers (CHI'20)

Call Me by My Name (CHI'19)

A World Following Farmer Almanac (DIS'19)

Expected-Experience Entanglements (CHI'19)
Confabulation Radio (CHI'19)

Once Upon a Future (DIS'18)

Craft consciousness (CHI'15)

Readings:
Mark Weiser, Computer for the 21st Century

評分方式: (Grading)
1. 個人表現 60% + 團隊表現 40 %
    Personal performance 60% + Team performance 40 %

2. 評分項目: 課堂出席、參與討論﹐、互相評論、競賽作品完整度。
    Evaluation items: course participation, discussion, critique, completeness of ACM competition

加入課程群組:

join course group (course syllabus updated every week) :

week 16. final project

 

week 15. project discussion & writing guides

 1. final project progress report  

     Designing Cultural Probes  with ESP32cam and AI  

Demo & Exhibition
1. Probes Demo (Probes Design and returned Cultural Probes)
2. 10 mins presentation (using PPT or report in ACM format)

Report:
1. ACM SIGCHI Extend Abstract (EA) format 6~10 pages
2. includes: 

    Introduction

    Background

    Design research questions

   The Cultural Probes Design

   The Data Collection

   Framing with Strong Concepts  (*optional)

   Results

   Findings and Implications 

   Possible Design Proposal (*optional, with Annotated Portfolios)

   Discussion

   Conclusion

   References

3. photos include (but not limited to): Cultural Probes, Data Collecting Scenarios, interviews, user returned data, Design Proposal (*option),

Due date: 12/18, 2024
upload to google drive

submission to ACM CHI LBW or DIS is welcome:

https://chi2025.acm.org/for-authors/late-breaking-work/

• Submission deadline: Thursday, January 23, 2025

https://dis.acm.org/2025/

Abstract Paper/ Pictorials

13 January 2025

Full Paper/ Pictorials

20 January 2025

PWiP / Doctoral Consortium

21 March 2025

Example:

AI Cat Narrator

Re.Dis.Cover Place with Generative AI

Designing PhenoProbe

Experiential Persona

Designing a Speculative Kit for Technology Imagination with Makers

Call Me by My Name

A World Following Farmer Almanac

Expected-Experience Entanglements
Confabulation Radio
Craft consciousness

Once Upon a Future

footpal team 2010
paper
BlindNavi 2015

2. 寫作工具書:

英文研究論文寫作：關鍵句指引（第四版）廖柏森

英文研究論文寫作：段落指引（第二版）廖柏森

3. 英文工具網站:

(1)  段落範例句: http://www.ref-n-write.com/trial/how-to-write-a-research-paper-academic-phrasebank-vocabulary/

 

(2) 學術字列表 Academic Word List (AWL):

    https://www.eapfoundation.com/vocab/academic/awllists/

(3) Translate with GAI

week 14. designing frames of interactive things

1. students present progress report of final project + Annotated Portfolios

2. framing interactive things:

    embodiment, metaphor, agency, perceptual crossing
2.

Understanding expressions of internet of things from Rung-Huei Liang



3.
能動性 (agency)

知覺交錯模型下的物件能動性.pdf (見FB 社團)


Exercise:
Design your artifacts with the above two frameworks.

Ref:

Rung-Huei Liang. 2015. Forms and Expressions of Internet of Things.　第一屆科技藝術國際學術研討會(ISAT 2015), Jan 10- 11, Taipei, Taiwan.

Leila Takayama. 2012. Perspectives onagency interacting with and through personal robots. In Human-Computer Interaction: The AgencyPerspective (pp. 195-214). Springer Berlin Heidelberg.

week 13. annotated portfolios

1. what are the annotations of these music players?

Wild Urban Radio

skube

Spotify box from Jordi Parra on Vimeo.

spotify box

BERG Olinda Project

olly radio 

Discuss and sketch a new radio.
Ref: radio design in Pinterest

2. 

What are the possible annotations for Wake-up light?

X

What are the possible annotations for Scentonight?

What are the possible annotations for Fonckel?

What are the possible annotations for Twins?

What are the possible annotations for Goodnight Lamp?

Draw a new sketch based on these annotated portfolios

Ref: Lighting & Interaction in Pinterest

reference:

What should we expect from research through design?

Annotated portfolios 

suggested forms:

   (1) Ving + adj. + N.

   (2) N. and N.

   (3) Ving+ N. + as + N.

   (4)  N. + for + N.

 

suggested concerns:

• the functionality of the design (what should it do?) and by implication the value of certain activities (is this worth doing?)

• its aesthetics (what form and appearance should the artifact take?) 

• the practicalities of its production (what materials, skills, and tools are needed to make it?) 

• the motivation for making (why are we doing this? what are we trying to show?) 

• the identities and capabilities of the people for whom the artifact is intended (what will our users make of this? how can we best design for them?) 

• sociopolitical concerns (what sort of culture will this encourage or resist?)

The logic of annotated portfolios: communicating the value of 'research through design'

Strategies for Annotating Portfolios: Mapping Designs for New Domains

Feature research:

 

Designing with AI: An Exploration of Co-Ideation with Image Generators

Final project annotated portfolios presentation:

1. Progress report

2. Each group present at least 4 relevant artifacts and their annotations

as "stragegies for annotating portfolios", describe your annotations and design space 

Deadline: Dec. 4th, 2024

week 12. coding & thematic analysis

0. Students present preliminary results of cultural probes

First :
 Things making Things: An Ethnography of the Impossible


What is ethnography ?
What is phenomenology?
How do they relate to design?


1.

Ethnographic vs Phenomenological Research Designs

2. Qualitative methodologies: ethnography, phenomenology, grounded theory and more

3. very short introduction:

Notes on Ethnography and Design

phenomenological approach:

I

1.  （phenomenological epoché）(現象學懸置) bracket

2. （eidetic intuition）「本質直觀」

3 . phenomenological reduction (現象學還原)

      懸置：存而不論，也就是排除一切預設立場與預設方法

      本質直觀：對現象進行直觀的描述，尋找其本質
      現象學還原：懸置之後，透過對事物的"直觀描述"，尋找其本質性
                          的基礎。

II 

   Phenomenological Interpretation

4. Blomberg et al. 經典:
An Ethnographic Approach to Design

5. Ethnographic Data Analysis:
     http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~irene/l17-ethnography_analysis.pdf

6. Method: Thematic Analysis

     https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/thematic-analysis/ 

    six-step process: 

      familiarization, 

      coding, 

      generating themes, 

      reviewing themes,

     defining and naming themes, 

     writing up.

Question:
1. how to apply ethnography (/phenomenology) to "cultural probes", how to apply ethnography (/phenomenology) to the study of design artifacts?

2. when to use ethnography? when to use phenomenology?

3. How to practically use "coding" and "thematic analysis" in cultural probes?

week 11. framing design

1. work in progress report

   check: themes, and strong concepts

   (group discussion in 10 mins and present)

   example : interaction Tarot
   https://interactiontarot.wordpress.com/

   

2. Framing design

Framing design in the Third Paradigm

Reference:
The Three Paradigms of HCI

Interaction Tarot: A Card-BasedDesign of Knowledge Construction for Brainstorming in HCI.

Poetics of Future Work: Blending Speculative Design withArtistic Methodology

[Exploratory Framing] progress report (11/20)

1. presenting collected data, organizing if necessary

2. What are the ordinary and non-ordinary data? What are the possible implications?

3.  Probe-primed interview, or probe-primed auto-ethnography

4. What are the focusing, grounding, priming, and  framing and re-framing of your projects? What are anticipatory framing and social framing?

5. What are the expression of your data suggest?

week 10. strong concepts

1. work-in-progress report of cultural probes


2. Strong concepts

1. Jonas Löwgren. 2013. Annotated portfolios and other forms of intermediate-level knowledge.interactions 20, 1 (January 2013), 30-34.

2. Kristina Höök and Jonas Löwgren. 2012. Strong concepts: Intermediate-level knowledge in interaction design research. ACM Trans. Comput.-Hum. Interact. 19, 3, Article 23 (October 2012), 18 pages.

(pp. 23:11- 23:13)
4 constructs:
1. contextual grounding
2. horizontal grounding
3. vertical grounding
4. reflection, articulation, and abstraction

4.

Between theory and practice: bridging concepts in HCI research

Somaesthetic Appreciation Design (CHI15)

Guidelines for Design Process:
1. Interpret your data with rich interpretation, inspiration, imagination, and discourse.
2. Specify several "themes" related to the above interpretation.
3. Build "strong concepts" (in terms of 4 constructs) to meet these themes
4. Give form to these strong concepts, such as mood boards, and cards.
5. Discuss possible expressions (如何用 expression 開展設計) for your design based on these strong concepts

week 9. probology

1. students present Cultural Probes for each team
2. 

Cultural probes from Rung-Huei Liang

3. introducing
"How HCI Interprets the Probes":

2. X-Probes:
(1) identify probes
(2) urban probes
(3) domestic probes
(4) value probes
(5) empathy probes
(6) mobile probes
(7) digital cultural probes
(8) cognitive probes
(9) technology probes

3. original probes features v.s. x-probes

epistemology-> methodology -> methods
epistemology->probology->probes


References

Cultural probes and the value of uncertainty

Interpreting the Probes for final project, each team:
1. write down your own probology rules (or beliefs)
2. redesign your probes with various media and methods, according to your probology
3. collect probing data
4. interpret the data, seek the meanings, and perhaps the underlying intentionality behind phenomena.

week 8. probes as methods

1. ESP32CAM Tutorial Q/A

References:
Gaver: Design: Cultural Probes, 1999
Wallace: How Design Probes Work, 2013

Recent cases:

Pop-Up Probes: Using Pop-up Paper Elements for Cultural Probes to Understand Domestic Routines (MuC '22)

How Design Researchers Interpret Probes: Understanding the Critical Intentions of a Designerly Approach to Research (CHI'21)

Tricky Design Probes: Triggering Reflection on Design Research Methods in Service Design (DIS'20)

Towards a Probe Design Framework (OZCHI'19)

more detail examples in

Probe Tools (Task Cam)

TaskCam: Designing and Testing an Open Tool for Cultural Probes Studies (CHI18)

Making design probes work

Designing for an other Home: Expanding and Speculating on Different Forms of Domestic Life (DIS 18) (Diversifying the Domestic: A Design Inquiry into Collective and Mobile Living, DIS19)

Designing Memory Probes to Inform Dialogue (DIS18)

Share on

Evaluation Probes

Perspective probe: many parts add up to a whole perspective

Medium probes: exploring the medium not the message

Urban probes: encountering our emerging urban atmospheres (CHI05)

See you on the subway: exploring mobile social software

Vulnerability of displacement: challenges for integrating refugees and asylum seekers in host communities

Making history: intentional capture of future memories

Researching sensitive topics: Adjusting cultural probes to research and identify design spaces for sensitive HCI.

situated visualization & co-speculation

Sketching and Ideation Activities for Situated Visualization Design (DIS19)

Bespoke Booklets: A Method for Situated Co-Speculation (DIS19)

Botanical Printer: An Exploration on Interaction Design with Plantness (DIS18)

Exploring The Future of Data-Driven Product Design (CHI20)

IoT Data in the Home: Observing Entanglements and Drawing New Encounters (CHI20)

student example:

A World Following Farmer Almanac

Expected-Experience Entanglements
Confabulation Radio
Craft consciousness

Report:

1.  Each student present one type of probes in "How HCI Interprets the Probes" 

2. X-Probes:

(1) identify probes
(2) urban probes
(3) domestic probes
(4) value probes
(5) empathy probes
(6) mobile probes
(7) digital cultural probes
(8) cognitive probes
(9) technology probes

  (canceled)

2. Final project progress report (Oct 30, 2024)

week 7. observation methods

tutorial: ESP32 CAM (by TA)

Questions:
1. What is Observation in Design Process?
2. What observation methods are there?
3. What is the method of Cultural Probes?
4. How to design Cultural Probes ?
5. How to collect/analyse/interpret data?

Interaction design methods from Timo Arnall

smart things by M.

Chapter 14. Observation and Ideation


A bAsic observAtion method



1. Define the scope of the observation
2. Pick an audience
3. Observe for an extended period
4. Document observations
5. Interview representatives
6. Organize observations
7. Identify patterns
8. make recommendations


SPECIFIC METHODS:

14.1.2.1 digital ethnography and Public Photos

Ethnography and Design from The Added Value Group

14.1.2.2 diary studies
14.1.2.3 design Probes
           Cultural Probes
           Technology Probes

14.2 iDeatiOn

     IDEO methods cards
     IDEO methods cards app
 
     www.interactioncards.org


14.2.2 new ideAtion tools
14.2.2.1 crowdsourcing


1. Invite people to generate ideas using a fixed set of criteria.
2. generate hundreds or thousands of ideas.
3. Invite other people to evaluate the quality of the ideas generated by the people in the first
group. Use multiple people to evaluate each idea (or set of ideas) and average the results.
4. Use the highest rated ideas as seeds for further ideation in-house.

14.2.2.2 bodystorming

Methods intro diagram from Goldsmiths design

Reference:
Gaver: Design: Cultural Probes, 1999
Wallace: How Design Probes Work, 2013

Designing Memory Probes to Inform Dialogue (DIS18)

Peekaboo Cam: Designing an Observational Camera for Home Ecologies Concerning Privacy

Designing PhenoProbe: An Interview Tool for Inquiring into the Phenological Knowledge of Taiwanese Elders (CHI24)

AI Cat Narrator: Designing an AI Tool for Exploring the Shared World and Social Connection with a Cat (DIS24)

Re.Dis.Cover Place with Generative AI: Exploring the Experience and Design of City Wandering with image-to-image AI (DIS24)

Final Project (ACM SDC Project Probes): stage 1 (initial probes design & interview)

(see week 1 introduction for submission info.)
1. Design you Probe Package (deadline 2024/10/30)
    Shoot all your package elements in row and column, upload to google drive.
2. Conduct Probing
3. Interview and Report (Deadline 2024/11/6)

week 5. presentation & discussion

I. Students present EX2: Living with data 

             auto-ethnography method

Questions:
1. How do we live with data?
2. How do we perceive (feel) the data we live with?
3. What is the form of data to live with?
4. How are the correlation of different data?

References:

Paul Dourish and Edgar Gómez Cruz. 2018. Datafication and data fiction: Narrating data and narrating with data. Big Data & Society 5, 2 (2018). 

Felix Heibeck, Alexis Hope, and Julie Legault. 2014. Sensory Fiction: A Design Fiction of Emotional Computation. In Proceedings of the 2nd ACM International Workshop on Immersive Media Experiences (ImmersiveMe '14). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 35–40. https://doi.org/10.1145/2660579.2660585

Data Epics: Embarking on Literary Journeys of Home Internet of Things Data

II. revisit "calm technology" and "back to the real world"  

Mark Weiser, Designing Calm Technology

  calm technology/ambient intelligence/ambient awareness

Questions:

1. Data and attention issues. Which data should get into our attention? in what form?

2. How to design calmer experience ?

3. How does "locatedness" play a role? What is spatial intelligence (in problem solving like disassembling and assembling a bike)?

4. Where, How, are data displayed? Digital or Tangible? Raw data, classified data, computed data, or AI processed data?

III. team-building and group discussion of final project 

week 4. back to the real world

 1. students present "Broken IT Probes"

Questions:

1. What is the meaning when IT products break?

2. Why people keep broken IT products?

3. How will the broken IT product become further broken? Can you imagine a  "kintsugi" style of your IT product in terms of material or metaphor? What if GAI can generate some samples for you? 

References:

Broken probes: toward the design of worn media

Antiquarian Answers

japanese "kintsugi" (金繼)

Sen no Rikyu (千利休) : wabi sabi

kintsugi

 

also  (mac restoration)

https://youtu.be/hwMAmKAoIkA?si=DpbsatZkuaJ_LT_0

Droog: Do Break

2. VR vs. AR

VR:  Sutherland, I. A head-mounted three dimensional display. In Proceedings FJCC 1968, Thompson Books, Washington, DC, 1968

Mark Weiser, Computer for the 21st Century, 1991

Communications of the ACM Volume 36, Issue 7July 1993Special issue on computer augmented environments: back to the real world

    

            Back to the real world

        

            Knowledge-based augmented reality

            Environmental technology: making the real world virtual

Milgram, Paul; H. Takemura; A. Utsumi; F. Kishino (1994). "Augmented Reality: A class of displays on the reality-virtuality continuum" . Proceedings of Telemanipulator and Telepresence Technologies. pp. 2351–34.

Mark Weiser, Designing Calm Technology, 1995

Tangible bits: towards seamless interfaces between people, bits and atoms, CHI'97

Magical Realist Design, DIS 2020

3. short group discussion about ACM CHI competition 

    (present next week)