Codesign of toys: An experience of social construction among children, child educators and industrial designers

Abstract

This intrinsic case study aims to understand the role of children in codiseño de juguetes, a process which involved the co-design of toys with students in the bachelor’s degrees of Industrial Design and Early Childhood Education, as well as with professors of these two degrees. Codiseño de juguetes was the unit of analysis of this study. The participatory, intergenerational, multidisciplinary space generated by this process was inspired by the Reggio Emilia Approach and the Transformative Paradigm and Social Justice. Findings show that the role of children was informative-oriented in stages such as identification of interests and idea creation, identifying a number of pragmatic affordances associated with the toys’ prototypes. The active role of children as subjects of rights was revealed in the codesign process when children were able to express freely their opinion and participated in the decision-making processes linked to the characteristics and functions of the prospective toys. Finally, limitations and recommendations for future research are discussed in this article.