Abstract
Traditional teaching methods and models, mainly based on the heritage of the 20th century, are facing a structural crisis in the challenge of an increasingly complex world in which students are being prepared for professions “that do not yet exist”. Moreover, the typical skills of literacy, numeracy, articulacy, and recently introduced graphicacy, seem to be no longer sufficient to transmit a range of intangible knowledge and values once passed on between generations within families and social communities.
In particular, some mechanisms of spontaneous transmission of soft skills and “atypical” knowledge seem to lose their effectiveness. From the digital natives to the current alpha generation, the processes and sources of information have migrated predominantly to the digital world, to social networks and virtual communities of interest. The interaction among peers, mediated by ICT platforms and devices, replaces the traditional inter-generational migration of expertise. Digital technologies, which have already been introduced into education and training, thus seem to be one of the possible strategies for offering alternative learning models.
The paper presents and discusses this topic from a theoretical-critical perspective as well as through practice-based research, i.e. a case study. It approaches the transmission of intangible knowledge and practical skills through a gamification approach. Traditional and previous generations’ ability is formalised and transposed into a mobile app that uses the typical mechanisms of playful engagement to teach, in this specific case, knitting.
Methodologically, the research adopted a human-centered design approach and qualitative methods of analysis and evaluation. In particular, a preliminary online questionnaire was used to understand the context, mechanisms and processes of learning in the field of Cultural & intangible heritage and of the didactic approach that considers technologies and digital design as cognitive and experiential enablers in the acquisition and transmission of knowledge. Personas, scenarios and user journeys have been developed, as well as the design of the process, experience and user interface. The developed interactive prototype has been then evaluated through personas & task-based user testing sessions. Though specifically designed for the world of knitting, the project is nevertheless a repeatable and scalable model, a conceptual and design framework in terms of approaches to learning intangible cultural heritage and practical skills tanks to digital tools to be further explored.