Design and signature pedagogies: which implications?

In the range of theories and practices related to the field of design, several “designerly” ways of knowing (Cross, 2007) can be detected, in which the axioms inherently characterizing the discipline converge independently from the multiplicity of professional domains in which it branches out. From an educational point of view, such qualities are commonly geared to the arrangement of learning experiences aimed at facilitating students in developing the ability to manage from both cognitively and executively the procedures connecting the ideation of a product, a service, or a process to its actual concretization. Particularly relevant in this regard is the confrontation with a “design culture” (Julier, 2008) appearing to be constantly in search for a balance between identity and ransversality, pointing out a juxtaposition in relation to which the educational system is faced with a twofold responsibility: on the one hand, that of transmitting to students an awareness about the existence of a professional and academic design community, endowed with a specific disciplinary status; on the other hand, that of fostering the acquisition of skills that will enable future designers to fruitfully integrate also within other knowledge areas. It is thus necessary to equip those working in the field of design education with both technical and intellectual tools that would empower them in addressing their teaching in order to appropriately interpret and enhance this polarity. On this basis, a particularly useful contribution is offered by the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL), a current of post-secondary studies oriented toward the consideration of the educational approaches adopted in the context of individual disciplines as indispensable factors in the processes of knowledge formulation and transmission. Attributing to the dynamics associated with teaching and learning a pivotal role in constituting the perspectives underlying codified knowledge, SoTL interprets education itself as a further upstream discipline, within which expertise can be reflexively built up (Hutchings, 2000). One of the most significant contributions introduced by SoTL lies in the theory of “signature pedagogies” (Shulman, 2005), a conceptual construct aimed at delving into the fundamental criteria that shape, to an only partially conscious extent, the mindset of scholars, educators and professionals; in configuring a bridge between the theoretical and practical dimensions, these frameworks reflect the forma mentis shared by the members of individual disciplinary communities, expressing the main cognitions they possess regarding how it is most appropriate to act, think and know in order to operate appropriately in their respective fields. In the wake of various studies emerging in recent decades on the topic of the relationship between design and signature pedagogies, this essay identifies the concept as a notion of particular strategic interest in order to understand more deeply the “hybrid” disciplinary status of design, and consequently to orient its educational practices. In accordance with these premises, such a relationship will be first framed from an internalist perspective, reflecting a principle of disciplinary affirmation, and then explored from an externalist perspective, consistent with an assumption of cross-sectoral integration