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From the islands of knowledge to a shared understanding: interdisciplinarity and technology literacy for innovation in smart electronic product design

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Abstract

In the context of the evolving Internet, a balance between technological advances and meaning change is crucial to develop innovative and breakthrough “connected electronics” that enable the Internet of Things. Designers and technologists are key enablers of this process respectively, ensuring adequate users’ needs and technology development, inside the evolving context of social environment and human relations. Smart electronic product design must be a truly interdisciplinary process, in which technologists are aware of how much their decisions impact the user-product relationship and designers understand the full potential and associated limitations of technology involved. Shared knowledge and communication are essential in this scenario, but, due to their technological limitations, designers are often excluded from high-level decision processes. In this paper, we address the design of constructivist tools and associated strategy to enhance the technological literacy of designers, as a strong foundation for knowledge-based dialogue between these realms. We demonstrate its effectiveness in a long-term multidisciplinary Project-Based Learning application with Design and Electronics students. We present the cases from 2 years’ experimentation (with the first year as control group) that demonstrate improvement in the quality of teamwork; in learning results; improved performance of the students reflected in the quality of the projects developed; and positive teachers’ and students’ evaluations. We conclude that the use of the proposed tool not only provides the designer an active voice in the process of designing smart electronics, but also promotes an effective common language between these two worlds.

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Acknowledgments

This research has been partially supported by the programme of Teaching Innovation at the University of Zaragoza since 2006. We thank our colleagues at Open Hybrid Projects at the University of Zaragoza (PHiLUZ) where the research was planned, and our colleagues from the Department of Design Engineering and Manufacturing and from the Department of Electronic Engineering and Communications who served as teachers at some point of the course editions. We also thank the students who participated in the courses.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aragon Institute of Engineering Research, Universidad de Zaragoza, C/Mariano Esquillor, s/n, 50018, Saragossa, Spain

    Teresa Blanco, Roberto Casas & Ángel Asensio

  2. Department of Design Engineering and Manufacturing, University of Zaragoza, C/María de Luna, 3, 50018, Saragossa, Spain

    Teresa Blanco & Eduardo Manchado-Pérez

  3. Department of Electronic Engineering and Communications, University of Zaragoza, C/María de Luna, 1, 50018, Saragossa, Spain

    Roberto Casas & Jose M. López-Pérez

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  1. Teresa Blanco
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  2. Roberto Casas
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  3. Eduardo Manchado-Pérez
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  4. Ángel Asensio
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  5. Jose M. López-Pérez
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Correspondence to Teresa Blanco.

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Blanco, T., Casas, R., Manchado-Pérez, E. et al. From the islands of knowledge to a shared understanding: interdisciplinarity and technology literacy for innovation in smart electronic product design. Int J Technol Des Educ 27, 329–362 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-015-9347-7

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