VIRTUAL MADRID FOCUS ON PEDAGOGY

Abstract

Feedback is a critical part of learning but what forms can it take, ideally? This presentation reports on an interview- and survey-based research project designed to reveal current attitudes and practices from students and instructors surrounding graphic design feedback and criticism in the contemporary classroom, along with evaluative frameworks that can help guide productive critique. While the visual arts and graphic/visual communication arts share a long-established culture of the critique, feedback given in a graphic design classroom is specific to applied arts’ predetermined goals. Peer-to-peer critical viewing, which often includes dialogue, fosters critical thinking along with an iterative improvement process: create a design, get feedback, make revisions, re-present the design—repeating as necessary in a loop. Design students learn to look closely at other students’ work and their own to give and receive feedback. This type of feedback embraces critical thinking that encourages the development of visual literacy while also developing discipline-specific vocabulary, both verbal and written. Feedback from others is essential, both for student practice and growth and for preparing emerging designers for future client relationships in the field. This presentation reveals current attitudes about what constitutes a constructive critique in the eyes of both students and instructors along with different styles of instructor modeling which inform best practices in graphic design education.