the future of Children, May 2008

Club of Amsterdam

pdf version
A Co-Production with the Waag Society

Learning to Play – How kids today are shaping the future of a participatory culture

Presentations

by
Yumiko Mori, President, Pangaea click to download

Dennis Kaspori, Architect, founding member, The Maze Corporation click to download

Ronald Hünneman, Philosopher click to download

and
Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century by Henry Jenkins

‘In a good computer game you will discover new rules when you reach a higher level. If you’re stuck in a game, most of the time it is because you thought you knew the rules. And then you discover a new rule that can bring you further.’ – Jim, 11 years old

The focus of this evening is on: how do kids and teenagers interact in a so called ‘participatory culture’? They seem to deal with it very naturally while many schools, organizations and businesses fail to deal with these new environments. If we want to create a culture where the ideas of the young generation are welcome, we have to understand these new rules and live by it. How can kids and teenagers show us the way?

‘According to a recent study from the Pew Internet & American Life project (Lenhardt & Madden, 2005), more than one-half of all teens have created media content, and roughly one third of teens who use the Internet have shared content they produced. In many cases, these teens are actively involved in what we are calling participatory cultures.

A participatory culture is a culture with relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, strong support for creating and sharing one’s creations, and some type of informal mentorship whereby what is known by the most experienced is passed along to novices. A participatory culture is also one in which members believe their contributions matter, and feel some degree of social connection with one another (at the least they care what other people think about what they have created)’ – Henry Jenkins, Director of the Comparative Media Studies Program, M.I.T.

Yumiko Mori, President, Pangaea
Collaborative tools for intercultural communication program
Development through interactions with children
Non Profit Organization Pangaea challenges to create an environment where children around the world can feel “bond” to each other regardless of cultures, languages, or geographical distances which all were considered barriers to connect them. In order to achieve such mission, we create collaborative tools for intercultural communication. We developed Pictogram communication software and activity contents from participants, children in four countries where they differ in spoken languages, time zones and cultures. The project is now ready to be deployed in Europe, Africa and Asia.

Dennis Kaspori, Architect, founding member, The Maze Corporation
Face Your World, Slotervaart?
Urban renewal is often a source of conflict between residents, developers and government. In the centre of the processes, and especially those wherein the city life twists, cultural interventions are often the only manner in which engagement in these processes can again be generated. The StedelijkLab (UrbanLab) functions in this way. It is an open design studio where members of a neighbourhood collectively work on the design of their daily environment. The Lab is a place to deal with issues like urban renewal, education, neighbourhood participation and tries to connect them within the context of a concrete design assignment.

Ronald Hünneman, Philosopher
Self City
In the project Self City a computer game is developed which enables youngsters to enrich their set of possible social behaviours. The core of the program consists of the personality theory of Prof. Dr. Hubert Hermans. This theory is the basis upon which the youngsters are diagnosed and offered alternative responses to difficult social encounters. The scenarios of Self City are developed in close collaboration with youngster. In workshops organized at schools of varying levels and background youngsters, together with actors and directors, devise new plots and situations which will be build into the game. The results of these workshops show their enormous creativity, and the intensity with which youngsters experience their social world.

Concept by Adriaan Wagenaar, consultant, coach, writer & concept developer, SATORI and Creative Learning Labs

19:00 – 20:00
Introduction by our Moderator
Adriaan Wagenaar, consultant, coach, writer & concept developer, SATORI

Part I:
Yumiko Mori, President, Pangaea
Collaborative tools for intercultural communication program
Development through interactions with children

Dennis Kaspori, Architect, founding member, The Maze Corporation
Face Your World, Slotervaart?

Ronald Hünneman, Philosopher
Self City

20:00 – 20:30
Coffee break with drinks and snacks.

20:30 – 21:15
Part II: Open discussion

Yumiko Mori
President, Pangaea

Graduated from Saint Mary’s College, California. Majored child psychology / early childhood education. Research intern at Schizophrenia Biology Research Center, Palo Alto, Stanford Univ., she joined Japanese toy maker TOMY and was a manager for developmental toys for baby/preschooler in the midst of my doctor’s program at Education Dept. of UCLA. She became independent in 1999 to work on the development of the space for children, so that she can demonstrate her own belief that the harmonization among the tool (toy), the space and the human relationships is critical for the development of children.

Her proposed space for children were realized as R&D Center of Workshops for Children known as Okawa Center CAMP (Children Art Museum and Park) located in Kyoto, in April 2001, sponsored by CSK Corporation as part of its social contribution program.

She became a visiting researcher of MIT Media Lab in 2002, and started the project Pangaea to create the universal playground on the cyberspace, where children across the globe can connect. She and Toshiyuki Takasaki founded Pangaea, and it was registered as a certified non-profit organization by Tokyo Prefecture in April 2003. Over 2800 children around the world participated the program in four years and it is ready to expand its operation.
www.pangaean.org

Dennis Kaspori, Architect, The Maze Corporation

Dennis Kaspori (1972) is an architect and a founding member of The Maze Corporation, an office for research and design on issues related to the urban condition, public space and housing. He is focused on the development of an engaged architectural practice that seeks new spatial solutions these issues in close collaboration with other fields of expertise (philosophy, art, graphic design, economy and software-development). The article ?A communism of ideas, towards an architectural open source practice? was published in Archis. Together with Jeanne van Heeswijk he?s currently involved in Face Your World (Amsterdam), The Blue House (Amsterdam) and SkillCity/Freehouse (Rotterdam). Also the online urban information market Damrax has been recently launched.
www.faceyourworld.nl

Ronald Hünneman, Philosopher
Self City

Ronald Hünneman studied philosophy at the University of Groningen. He teaches philosophy, mainly to adults. Besides that he has, for the past 13 years, been working with youngsters with behavioural problems. First as an official commissioned to maintain compulsory full-time education, later on as a teacher at a school for youngster which due to their behaviour could find no regular school to go to. In 2002 Hünneman was among the persons who took the initiative to Self City. In Self City gaming techniques are used to enrich the behavioural repertoire of social an emotional handicapped youngsters. Hünneman is a columnist for Onderbouw Magazine. He has written on different philosophical topics (such as free will, memes and the indeterminacy of translation). His blog – in Dutch – offers a reasonable representation of his interest and style of philosophizing.
http://liaturches.blogspot.com

Adriaan Wagenaar
consultant, coach, writer & concept developer, SATORI

Adriaan Wagenaar (1965) is consultant, coach, writer and concept developer in the field of brand strategy and customer experiences. He encourages organizations to look to their business in new ways: through the eyes of a child. And he encourgages children to develop these skills at school. Therefore he regularly conducts philosophy sessions with children in schools and writes about their values and ideas in magazines like Happinez – www.happinez.nl.

In the past he worked as a researcher and strategist at advertising agencies FHV/BBDO and PMSvWY&R in the Netherlands.

Adriaan works for clients like Robeco Direct, Rabobank, ING Bank Netherlands, Nationale Nederlanden, Philips Corporate Design, ANWB, Nederlandse Staatsloterij, KPN, TNT Post, SCA Molnlycke,, IKEA, ENECO energy, Dutch Railways, Amnesty International, Oxfam Novib, Reed Business (Elsevier Health Care), KNSB.

In 2006 his book ‘Grote Denkers Kleine Denkers’ was published. In this book, visions of children meet those of leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Richard Branson and Michael Jordan in a way that new insights in management dilemmas show up – www.grotedenkerskleinedenkers.nl.

Adriaan is a ‘forward thinker’ in brainstorm sessions, workshops and seminars.

Other activities include guest lectures and teaching assignments at de Rotterdam School of Management (IMBA Program: International Presentation Skills, Managing Cultural Differences), Academy for Enterpreneurship of the University of Groningen (Corporate Change), University of Amsterdam (Authentic Leadership) en NCOI Education Group (post graduate course Strategic Management, Performance Management, Marketing Management, Marketing Communication Management, Creating Customer Focussed Organizations)
www.satoristrategy.nl