Abstract:

This paper is the outcome of different teaching experiences at the School of Design of the Politecnico di Milano.
The EU underlines, in several recent documents, the importance of research, of the education for research, of the promotion of interdisciplinary approach, of internationalization to maintain and improve the higher education level and strengthen its competitiveness. Within our institution there is an educational model based on the so called Research and didactic units, between which there is a virtuous circle.

Research through design is the kind of research that pertains to education more closely: Design is the vehicle of research and represents also a tool to communicate the results. Research through design has been investigated by many authors that suggested different interpretation as practice-lead research, action research or project grounded research as Findeli defines it. He underlines the role of creativity in this type of research and claims its independence from other discipline:
“[…] we are left with the convinction that there is indeed a specific "designerly way of knowing", that this knowledge and its objects deserve to be investigated and that creativity is a necessity, not only for design practice, but also for design research. Also, we may be confident that, after having depended on so many foreign - sometimes even exotic - academic disciplines, design is about to gain its sovereignty and to contribute to general knowledge, by posing new and relevant research questions and by helping reduce uncertainty and ignorance about what concerns us all: the nature, meaning, and purpose of the relationships of human beings with the world, especially the artificial world.”
Starting from the virtuous circle between research and education and the importance of creativity in Design activities the paper will explore the example of Metadesign studios.
If nowadays knowledge is less and less linked to the contents acquisition and it identifies more with the ability of coding and de-coding messages, the Metadesign studio has the purpose to give an approach to design knowledge, to learn to learn, to develop metacognitive skills, to acquire autonomy in coding and decoding information.
The necessity of decoding the professional practice is the core of inductive approach and inside our course this translates in role game where students have to cooperate inside small design teams to develop a specific project for a definite company.

The paper will develop the following point:
- Metadesign
- Team working and collaboration activity
- Room to creativity: mood-board as poetic moment
- Concept creation in team dynamics
- From concept to product
- Learn from project: the capability to capitalize (exploit) an experience.

Keywords:

metadesign, metacognitive approach, creativity, collaboration, boosting activity.