Bridges of Joy – A Case Study of the Collaborative Design Learning Process the University Teacher Students

Abstract

This is a qualitative case study of the design learning process in one arts educational project of 14 student teachers. The purpose of the study is to explore and describe the design process of the student teachers during their collaborative study project with pre-school and school pupils for children’s hospital children. They created animated films for the hospitalized children. The theme of this project was Bridges of Joy and its purpose was to bring joy to and connect children from different learning environments. In this arts educational project, new learning technological applications and techniques, like iPads and social media were used and combined with an integrated collection of children’s stories, visual arts and sound colours made of instruments and human voice. Data was gathered through participatory observations and writings from a closed Facebook project group. The qualitative research methods used include analyses, descriptions of observations, and discussions with the students. Content analysis of students’ reflective and evaluative writings about the creative learning process was also performed. The results show that the collaborative design learning method fits very well into integrated arts educational studies, as does the use of modern technological applications.