An Exploratory Experiment of Layout Design Curriculum with Layered Grids Approach

Kuei To Wang Chaoyang University of Technology

168, Jifeng E. Rd., Wufeng District, Taichung, 41349 Taiwan

+886-4-2332000 ext. 4552 kueiwang@cyut.edu.tw

Yao-Hua Lee Chaoyang University of Technology

168, Jifeng E. Rd., Wufeng District, Taichung, 41349 Taiwan

+886-4-2332000 ext. 7182 steven1208@gmail.com

ABSTRACT This exploratory study was conducted to understand importing layered grids as an assignment in editorial design courses, and to explore relevant variables which may affect curriculum performance. A double-grid layered experimental poster design assignment was assigned to sophomore design students. A self-evaluation questionnaire and expert group meeting followed for comparison analysis. Results showed that students with positive attitudes towards grid-based design assignments have stronger motivation to face challenges, and can solve the problem more distinctly and delicately. Those who consider grid designs as a constraint tend to take conservative and safer approaches towards designing. How to overcome students’ psychological barriers and break away from the limitation of personal work habits are proposed as the essential goal for further curriculum reform. The study suggests that a variety of effective problem-solving approaches found from the experiment may be provided in advance, in the course description, to improve students’ self-confidence synchronously.

CCS Concepts • CCS → General and reference ➝ Cross-computing tools and techniques ➝ experimentation

Keywords Grid-based layout; Layered grids; Exploratory experiment

1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background The grid-based design was developed by Swiss designers during the 1950s and was known as the Swiss Style or the International Typographic Style rooted from de Stijil, Bauhaus, and the new typography of the 1920s and 1930s [1]. The style evolved as a symbol of conveying messages clearly in a cross-cultural manner. Due to its high efficiency and modern aesthetics, the grid has been a prevalent approach for layout design since then and has been recognized as a fundamental discipline for editorial design education. Since computer typesetting has become available, students can easily acquire templates for their layout. Along with the postmodern trend of deconstructed typography, there has been the

perception that grids are an obsolete layout tool, and not following the grid is more innovative. The researcher found that free-layout styles are more favorable today among graphic design students. Students tend to make layout decisions through their own sentiments rather than logic, even when they are assigned a grid-based design practice. This makes it difficult for student to develop problem-solving technique. Innovation is one of the goals of design education. An innovative curriculum design should be able to inspire a design student’s innovative thinking. In order to increase students’ flexibility in grid-based design and take care of students’ ambitions for breakthrough as well, an experimental layout assignment and research are conducted to gather the necessary information for curriculum reform.

1.2 Literature review 1.2.1 Grid-based layout design Grids are the underlying structure which serve to organize the information content and facilitate communication with an invisible structure. Through this, the viewer can sense a beauty of order which feeds into the natural harmony [2]. “The desire to bring order to the bewildering confusion of appearances reflects a deep human need.” [3]. The grid has been regarded as a symbol of rationality, progressive thinking, and universal approach central to both Modernism and Constructivism, and working with the grid system means submitting to laws of universal validity [4]. The initiators of the Swiss Style advocated that design should be grounded in universal artistic principles, and using a scientific approach should provide a well-defined solution to a problem [1]. Spatial division is a fundamental and crucial concept for layout, requiring the analysis and application of mathematical logic [5]. Hence the grid has been regarded as a scientific tool for layout. The grid-based layout enables images, words and other spatially co-present elements to be combined to form cohesive and coherent multimodal texts [6]. The central challenge and the difficulty for grid-based designs is to find the balance between maximum conformity to rule and maximum freedom [7]. Along with the time and social changes, the grid has become a matter of considerable controversy among contemporary designers. “In the hands of a less able designer, the grid can become a straitjacket that produces dull layouts and a rigid format” [8]. In spite of its advantages, many students and even professionals consider it a monotonous mechanical device which constrains their creative freedom [9, 10]. It is understandable that in the modern plural aesthetical society and segmented market, the monotype aesthetic of grid-based designs faces more challenges. Though it is a scientific approach with convenience in application, the grid-based approach needs to be restructured for current students who tend to pursue rule-breaking

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and outrageous designs. Teachers of editorial design curriculum will have to respond to this challenge.

1.2.2 Curriculum Experiment In the curriculum development process, school teachers are educational artists, and curriculum is the medium of action. Teachers take advantage of the medium of action to study knowledge, learning, teaching, and the nature of education [11]. Curriculum experiment is a research activity which uses experimental methods on the course implementation to explore the development of discipline theory or practice [12]. When the teacher considers teaching as an experimental process, regards the lesson as a hypothesis, and stresses that school teachers should have reflective capacity to examine and verify the test results of curriculum experiment, this is known as ‘Teacher as Researcher’ [13]. A curriculum experiment involves the part of trials. It is an exploratory activity full of creativity. In curriculum experiment research, teachers need to take proactive actions of change toward the situation of a target course [12]. The improvement resulting from the experiment method is more effective and direct than teacher’s inculcating [14]. Curriculum reform experiment calls for collaborative research with other teachers, professional researchers, and even students [15]. Experiment is an initiative and radical procedure of exploratory innovation. An exploratory method does not guarantee its success, but there must be a process, and the process ensures a result [16]. Graphic design is the creative use of visual content to solve specific visual communication problems, and is inherently practice-based [17]. The graphic design classroom is an environment which is structured to emulate the practices of professionals [18]. At all levels of graphic design, learning should be scaffolded to encourage students to embrace failure as part of the process of design, and to increase their tolerance for risk [18]. Studio-based pedagogies, such as project-based learning [19] are excellent ways for students to learn by doing, problem-defining, and problem-solving. Graphic design students are expected to find their own solutions to problems and adopt their own pathways to the development of creative work [20]. The activity and creativity of students has been neglected throughout the teaching process in conventional layout design education [21]. Although it is in progress, the development of students’ creativity requires more creative approaches designed by their teacher. In the world of creativity, design education intrinsically plays the role of stimulating students’ continuous innovation, and the curriculum experiment can act as a driver for innovative teaching methods.

1.2.3 Design evaluation The concept of evaluation can be defined as ‘a study designed and conducted to assist some audience to assess an object’s merit and worth’ [22]. Evaluation designs should be determined on the basis of an analysis of the problem that the object of evaluation is meant to resolve. The intention of evaluations designed upon the basis of this reasoning is to further develop the program [23]. Self-evaluation is a potentially powerful tool because of its positive impact on student performance through enhanced self-efficacy and increased motivation [24]. Research indicates that self-evaluation plays a key role in facilitating an upward progression of learning [25]. Evidence of the positive effect of self-evaluation on student performance is particularly convincing for difficult tasks [26, 27], especially in academically-oriented schools [28]. Design education essentially deals with guiding

students to discover their own ways of designing [29]. Design students can take advantage of self-evaluation to examine their own way of problem-solving and to observe or accumulate a successful experience. Other than self-evaluation, the judgement of design works, by teachers or experts, is one of the common ways in teaching, where both need criteria for a design assessment. Robin Landa proposed nine design criteria for poster design assessment including Articulated Message, Instant Readability, Long Distant Readability, Necessary Information Included, Visual Hierarchy, Unity, Well Organized Elements, and Subject Matter Being Expressed. [30] Alexander White suggested that Readability and Legibility are the two major criteria for judging layout designs. Readability means the attractiveness of the layout for readers, and it is the subjective favorableness of the entire work; an overall positive reading experience and an aesthetical preference at first glance. Legibility means the capability of being understood and recognized, belonging to the aspect of individual cognition. [31] Due to the grid-based layout design’s emphasis on the presentation of form, and this experimental study focusing on formal problem-solving, the criteria of the experimental poster assessment are set accordingly and loosely, to allow for unlimited possibilities. The criteria applied are Readability and Legibility, and the Readability is premised with the experimental requirements, including a) be able to identify two systems of order, b) present harmony, contradiction, and unity of both simultaneously, c) aesthetics and favorability; the Legibility is primarily on the recognition of text.

2. RESEARCH METHOD This exploratory study is conducted to understand importing layered grid designs as an assignment, and exploring relevant variables which may affect curriculum performance. The exploratory study involves an initial research to clarify and define the nature of the problem and is suitable for subjects which have little to no research done before. It aims to explore the insights of the problem [32, 33]. Under the absence of a research hypothesis, an exploratory experiment is conducted to gather the related variables. Exploratory experiments are frequently applied at an initial stage of new field or new research subject to explore the relationship of variables, and to propose a research hypothesis for a confirmatory experiment afterwards [34].

2.1 Research design 2.1.1 Research problem a. How does student define the design problem of assignment? b. What are the approaches student took to solve the problems? C. What are the factors affecting student’s problem-solving ability? d. How can the curriculum benefit from the research to improve student learning?

2.1.2 Research method Experimental poster design assignment assigned to students, self-evaluation questionnaire administered after completion, expert group meeting.

2.1.3 Research object 141 Sophomore students from department of VCD, CYUT. Students are requested to finish single-grid-based layout design training through a prior four-week course, and are supposed to be familiar with grid-based design practice.

Fig. 2 Sample poster of approach A

Fig. 3 Sample poster of approach B

Fig. 4 Sample poster of approach C

Fig. 5 Sample poster of approach D

Fig. 6 Sample poster of approach E

Fig. 7 Sample poster of approach F

2.1.4 Research Process Four editorial design teachers and experts were invited to join the research. The process: course description and assignment briefing→ poster design implementation→ designs handed in and self-evaluation administered→ designs and questionnaire analysis by expert group→ discussion and suggestions. A theme and text of the poster were offered to students. Students were then asked to design the poster, A2 size, by layering two grids at different angles (see fig.1) like the pre-designed requirement, and then in their own way. Students handed in the works and completed the self-evaluation forms 3 weeks later.

2.1.5 Questionnaire design Four open-ended questions as follows: a. What is the major problem you have met while doing the assignment? b. What are the other problems you have met? c. How have you solved the major problem? d. Do you consider have solved the above problems? £yes, £no, please explain why:____

2.1.6 Data analysis Content analysis was done on the questionnaires to code and sort keywords. An inductive analysis on posters and excellent exemplars picked out by the expert group were conducted to uncover the features of problem-solving. Both data were further examined by cross-comparison and statistical analysis.

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION From 141 participants of the experiment, 136 effective questionnaires were recovered. Based on the analysis of students’ feedback, the major problem students defined can be sorted into four categories sequentially as follows: 1) The problem concerning layout conflict (50.7%), 2) The constraint of grids (28.7%), 3) Beyond personal experience (11％), 4) Other factors (9.6%). Within Category 1, students wrote e.g. “how to balance layout”, “hard to sustain readability”, “how to get a comfortable but exciting look” etc. The study indicates that approximately half of the self-evaluated responses clearly defined the problem related to the learning goal and met the expected challenge (Table 1).

Table 1. Statistical analysis of questionnaires and posters Major problem faced

Category 1

Category 2

Category 3

Category 4

69 ( 50.7%)

39 (28.7 %)

15 (11 %)

13 (9.6 %)

Consider problem solved

34 ( 49.3%)*

19 ( 48.7%)*

9 ( 60%)*

7 ( 53.8%)*

Excellent works 20 ( 29%)*

4 ( 10.3%)*

3 ( 20%)*

1 (7.7 %)*

*percentage in terms of single category.

In Category 2, most answers like, “I am influenced by grid while laying texts, my layout is rigid”, “I’m stuck, it is not letting me do the layout according to my will or my aesthetics.” This type of thinking implies that they still thought of the grid as a restriction. Although some students, in fact, were trying to uncover the difficulties they were facing, such as “It’s easy to be confused by another grid while running on the first one,” most of the problems defined in such answers were not in sync with the assignment instruction. If the percentage of Category 3 are added to Category 2, about 39.7% students doing this assignment relied on their own limited experience as a primary source of thinking. Whether complaining about being constrained by the grid or it being beyond their personal experience, there is a psychological resistance among students, e.g. “Never done this before. I can't imagine how to use the double grid.” In terms of the problem-solving approaches students took (Table 2), the study shows that the majority of students adopted dividing the space into two safe zones without any conflict, which did not really meet the challenge (approach A, e.g. see fig. 2). However, when a sandwich approach was applied with carefully aligned elements across central grid elements, the prominent order of a double grid is achieved (approach B, e.g. see fig. 3). The third approach used lines or color blocks for spatial division to stabilize the structure, then filled the blocks with different angled texts to reduce the visual chaos (approach C, e.g. see fig. 4). A small number of excellent works demonstrated multiple experimental characteristics: scattered elements, types or graphics with both

grids, interruption of different grid elements, but echoing and alignment by the same grid elements at the far end (approach D, e.g. see fig. 5). The other commonly-used and effective solutions include: Layering the main dark elements of one grid on lighter color elements of another grid, and turning the light elements into textured background and dark types as visual emphasis (approach E, e.g. see fig. 6); Adjusting the strokes or parts of the headline typeface to fit in two grids and echoing the surrounding text

Fig.1 Layered grid

(approach F, e.g. see fig. 7); Graphically illustrating the space and integrating texts of different angles and directions into the scene (approach G, e.g. see fig. 8); Cutting the headline typeface with blocks of another grid and filling in texts of the former grid (approach H, e.g. see fig. 9). Excellent works frequently demonstrated a clear problem definition of the assignment expected and presented rational thought. For example, designer of fig.10 defined the problem as “How to handle the typesetting in different directions?” She claimed her way of problem-solving was to “Take a grid as basis for layout and choose some of its elements turned into the direction of another grid. I discover later that the pictures on the first grid can be cut following the second

grid to create resonance.” She is confident with her solution. Table 2. The amount of various approaches adopted in each

category by comparing check

Most of the students of Category 2 who thought they were constrained by the grid, took different approaches from Category 1, and their approaches usually focused on decoration or trying to get away from the rule of grid, “I would try to ignore the grid and do type distortion or play on the color blocks and lines in order not to look stiff.” However, some students found clarity, “I just thought layered grid complicated in the beginning. I thought it would be a problem to have slanted text and I have tried a lot.... until I asked the teacher and knew that it’s all right, I started to try all kind of possibilities and found accidentally that this approach is more changeful, better than single grid in use.” That means, once students find solutions to break through constraints, they may also develop creative solutions. 28 posters are picked out by the expert group in terms of the criteria set prior. There are 20 pieces in Category 1, accounting for 29% of the students who can clearly define the expected

problem, and 4 pieces in Category 2, accounting for 10.3% of the students who considered the grid as a constraint. It shows that the more students understand the objectives and definition of the experiment, the more chances they can produce better works. One of these students wrote “I hate to see two objects with different angles, but this is what I am asked to learn to make something with different angles stay together peacefully. I very much benefited from it.” It echoes the findings of Ulusoy [29], who found that those students who can extract formal characteristics of the projects they study can be better designers. The results of the questionnaire show that 49.3% of Category 1 and 48.7% of Category 2 students considered their problem solved. There is no obvious difference even when Category 3 are added to Category 2 (a total of 51.9%). However, it was found, through a comparative check between the posters (Table 3), that the works of those who considered their problem solved in Category 2 and 3 mostly tended to take safe approaches by dividing the space into two non-interfered zones, resembling those of the Category 1 who took the same approach but considered it an unresolved problem. It reveals that students with positive attitudes toward grid-based experiments have stronger motivation to face challenge and can solve the problem more distinctly and delicately.

Table 3. Statistical analysis of Approach A and problem- solving in each category by comparing check

4. CONCLUSION This study aims at exploring the influential factors behind the implementation of an experimental assignment for curriculum improvement. The result found that about thirty percent of students still regard grid-based designs as a restriction for creativity even when the preconditioned goal was to break away from the monotonous nature of single grid application, and from the perception of grids as a conservative framework. Result showed that these students’ works tend to be more conservative as well, met no challenges, or you can say, did not allow conflict to arise but claimed their problem to be solved. These students are

Fig.8 Sample

poster of approach G

Fig.9 Sample poster of

approach H

Fig.10 Sample poster of excellent rational thinking

Category Approach adopted

Category 1

Category 2

Category 3

Category 4

Approach A 23 27 5 2 Approach B 7 1 0 1 Approach C 8 4 3 5 Approach D 4 0 0 0 Approach E 6 3 2 2 Approach F 3 2 0 0 Approach G 5 0 0 1 Approach H 7 1 1 2 The others 6 1 4 0

Category Excellent works

Other works

Total amount (percentage)

1 Problem solved?

�: 17 �: 17 34 Î: 3 Î: 32 35

Approach A adopted

�/ 1 �/ 0 1 (2.9%) Î/ 1 Î/ 21 22 (62.9)

2 Problem solved?

�: 4 �: 15 19 Î: 0 Î: 20 20

Approach A adopted

�/ 4 �/ 11 15 (78.9) Î/ 0 Î/ 12 12(60%)

3 Problem solved?

�: 2 �: 7 9 Î: 1 Î: 5 6

Approach A adopted

�/ 1 �/ 3 4 (44.4%) Î/ 1 Î/ 0 1(16.6%)

4 Problem solved?

�: 1 �: 0 1 Î: 0 Î: 12 12

Approach A adopted

�/ 1 �/ 0 1(100%) Î/ 0 Î/ 1 1(8.3%)

�: yes, problem solved Î: no, problem unsolved “�:” the amount of considered problem solved “�/” the amount of approach A adopted in yes answer

under the restriction of the grid rather than being restrained by their individual work habits. Another major category of students accepted the design conditions, clearly perceived the goal, defined the expected problem, were able to move to the problem-solving process rationally, and tended to have a better chance to create excellent works. If the teacher can have the student step over personal design experience and follow the experiment’s design psychologically, better performance can be expected. And this is the initial intention of this curriculum assignment designed: to face layout problems with an instrumental approach to avoid the limitation of personal perception and to create a whole new design experience. Accordingly, it is suggested to strengthen the course description, infuse more positive knowledge of grid-based designs at the beginning, and remind students constantly to prevent relying on subjective work habit and increasing the willingness of rational thinking. Once they move into the scientific problem-solving process consciously and further explore the depth of the problem, they may build up a more effective problem-solving ability. The effective approaches undertaken by students revealed from the experiment, whether strong or weak, cannot tell the whole story. Based on the fact that there are quite a few students unconfident with grids and there is an absence of previously layered grids in the literature, presenting these approaches as a design case study in advance may help grow student’s self-confidence. For those who are interested in applying this experimental assignment to editorial design training, these approaches provide the teacher with some guidance tips as well. As for whether these approaches would decrease students’ creativity if provided in advance, or whether the entire experimental approach can effectively achieve the curriculum goal, it is suggested to run further causal studies for verification.

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AUTHORS’ BACKGROUND

Your Name Title Research Field Personal website

Kuei To Wang Full professor Visual communication design http://www.cyut.edu.tw/~kueiwang/about.html

Yao Hua Lee Lecturer/PhD candidate Visual communication design https://visual.cyut.edu.tw/

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