From Bauhaus to Makerspace: Meaning Design and Computer‐Aided Design in Introductory German

Abstract

AbstractThis article introduces a Bauhaus design apprenticeship for first‐semester German as a means of integrating multiple literacies and disciplines. In light of the need for interdisciplinary models of the multiliteracies framework in introductory‐level language curricula, a collaboration with the campus makerspace can enhance the humanities' critical literacies mission in general and the language literacies mission in particular. In the case of German, Bauhaus offers not only a source of multimodal texts with significant cultural, historical, and political content but also a theory of design that resonates with the metalanguage of design in multiliteracies pedagogy. The article proposes a Bauhaus‐multiliteracies framework and demonstrates its implementation through a “Bauhaus Lehre” in elementary German and the makerspace. Students learn the use of a simple Computer‐Aided Design (CAD) program in an instructional sequence aimed at describing and transforming language and objects alike. Student products and the results of surveys conducted with the first two groups of learners to complete the project show that learners began to envision connections between language literacy and their digital and social futures.