Participatory Design (PD) is a commonly used method in Western cultures with roots in Scandinavia. After the COVID-19 pandemic, many PD practitioners have transitioned to an online space, where researchers and participants from different geographical locations can co-design together. Yet, we do not fully understand how different cultures collide, mix and blend in the online co-design space. By understanding how one’s culture influences the participation of a child, researchers can better structure sessions to elicit diverse input. This study examines a case study of researchers and participants from South Korea and the United States co-designing together. Close analysis of video recordings, analytic memos, and parent/child interview data demonstrates the ways in which children participated in design sessions. Facilitators paid special attention to various cultural sensitivities. Applying the theory of cultural awareness from public health literature, we offer implications on how scholars who are not fully embedded in the culture where co-design happens can understand other cultural norms and in response, create spaces in which co-design can occur successfully despite different cultural norms. Our findings show how different parts of the ecological systems from ideology, education systems, and ethnicity all influence children’s participation in sessions.

Large-scale disparities in computing exist for many youth of color. Learning in informal settings can increase the participation of youth in computing; however, computing education programs have typically been developed by adults for youth. We argue computing education can contribute toward decolonization by directly involving youth from nondominant communities as design partners. When we directly involve youth voices, we can move away from focusing solely on the structural barriers faced by youth of color toward an assets-based approach. We examine a 10-week case study within KidsTeam Libraries, an intergenerational digital design program where local youth conceptualize what digital learning could look like in libraries. Our qualitative dataset includes over 15 hours of video recordings from participatory design sessions, six interviews with participants, 10 researcher jottings, and a corpus of 25 researcher memos written by researchers, librarians, and teens. Throughout our investigation, our knowledge claims are co-constructed with the two teenagers who led the design and implementation of a three-dimensional printing curriculum in their local library with 10 children. Our findings emphasize (1) the ways in which the involvement of teen leaders can foster and sustain community-level relationships for computing education; (2) how we noticed, enforced, and disrupted power within our computing education program; and (3) the systemic challenges we confronted in our process toward disrupting computing education. We provide empirical evidence of teen-led participatory design approaches for computing education in their community through detailed vignettes from sessions and through quotes from key participants. We contribute to the computing education community a novel approach in which youth are positioned as design partners for reimagining a computing education experience in libraries that centers and serves community members.

We perpetuate, reinforce, and have the opportunity to disrupt systemic injustices through the actions we take as individuals. As an IDC community, we have a responsibility to reflect upon our behaviors and the commitments we make to ensure our engagements with youth, especially those that identify as Black or brown, are justice-centered. In this workshop, we invite researchers and practitioners to reflect on what is at stake if the IDC community does not intentionally take a justice-centered approach throughout our methods, our research questions, and our everyday interactions with youth. The goals of our workshop are two-fold: (1) To share stories about the actions we take as researchers with power to influence change in our interactions with youth, and (2) To establish the commitments the IDC community can make for more equitable design and research engagements with youth.

Co-designing with children in an online environment is increasingly important due to external factors, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, and the diversification and inclusion of youth participants. Many prior studies about co-design with youth focus on co-located or asynchronous online sessions. However, conducting synchronous online co-design sessions adds layers of complexity and uncertainty to collaboration. This paper introduces a model explicating factors to consider when co-designing with children synchronously in an online space. We examined ten consecutive intergenerational participatory design sessions online where children (ages 7-11) and adults designed new technologies. Along with highlighting unexpected moments and interactions, we use theories of improvisation to guide our understanding of dynamic situations that are out of the control of researchers. This work contributes to improving theoretical understanding of improvisation as a method of inquiry for co-designing with youth, and offers practical suggestions for suitable online co-design techniques and implementation.

Abstract Libraries play a central role for youth and digital learning. As libraries transition to learning spaces, youth librarians can engage in aspects of democratic design that empowers youth. Participatory design (PD) is a user‐centered design method that can support librarians in the democratic development of digital learning spaces. However, while PD has been used in libraries, we have little knowledge of how youth librarians can act as codesign partners. We need a conceptual model to understand the role of youth librarians in codesign, and how their experiences are integrated into youth design partnerships. To generate this model, we examine a case study of the evolutionary process of a single librarian and the development of a library system's learning activities through PD. Using the idea of equal design partnerships, we analyzed video recordings and stakeholder interviews on how children (ages 7–11) worked together with a librarian to develop new digital learning activities. Our discussion focuses on the development of a participatory librarian design conceptual model that situates librarians as design partners with youth. The article concludes with recommendations for integrating PD methods into libraries to create digital learning spaces and suggestions for moving forward with this design perspective.

Research suggests that parental engagement through Joint Media Engagement (JME) is an important factor in children's learning for coding and programming. Unfortunately, parents with limited technology background may have difficulty supporting their children's access to programming. English-language learning (ELL) families from marginalized communities face particular challenges in understanding and supporting programming, as code is primarily authored using English text. We present BlockStudio, a programming tool for empowering ELL families to jointly engage in introductory coding, using an environment embodying two design principles, text-free and visually concrete. We share a case study involving three community centers serving immigrant and refugee populations. Our findings show ELL families can jointly engage in programming without text, via co-creation and flexible roles, and can create a range of artifacts, indicating understanding of aspects of programming within this environment. We conclude with implications for coding together in ELL families and design ideas for text-free programming research.

There has been a growing concern over the huge increase in use of smart media by young children. This study explores the possibility of using augmented-reality(AR) for regulat-ing preschoolers' media usage behavior. With MABLE (mobile application for behavioral learning and education), parents can provide AR-assisted feedback by changing facial expressions and sound effects. When overlaying a smart media, which has MABLE running, in front of a QR marker on a puppet, a facial expression is displayed on top of the puppet's face. A two-week long experiment with 36 parent-child pairs showed that compared to using just the puppet, using MABLE showed higher amount of engage-ment among preschoolers. For the effectiveness of parental mediation in terms of self-control, our data showed mixed results. MABLE had positive effects in that the amount of rule-compliance increased and problematic behaviors de-creased, whereas the level of behavioral dependency on smart media was not influenced.

Prior studies have focused on child interactions in participatory design (PD) with adults and children, but less is known about what specific adult-child interactions constitute a partnership. In this study, we unpack what constitutes an "equal partnership" in PD between adults and children. On the basis of prior literature, we created a new framework that examines the complementary roles between children and adults. Next, we analyzed a case study of a year-long intergenerational design team of children (ages 7-11) and adults. From this analysis, we determined that design partnerships are composed of four dimensions that span from unbalanced to balanced interactions: facilitation, relationship building, design-by-doing, and elaborating together. Finally, to demonstrate its utility, we analyzed two focal co-design sessions using our framework. Our analysis suggests that equal partnership in PD is not a single static interaction but a development over time of design interactions influenced by context, experience, and participants.

Prior research has established that long-term interests in programming are often shaped by formative computing experiences, especially those involving programming and graphics. Existing authoring environments for children (ages 9-14) to make 2D games and animations require them to: (a) create programs, (b) customize templates, or (c) combine rewrite rules with programs. One way to support early experiences in computing for a more diverse set of learners is to simplify such authoring systems, by removing text heavy code and minimizing cognitive load, which can allow separation of coding concepts from writing code. In this paper, we describe an exploratory system we are designing to test this idea, called BlockStudio. Using a Programming By Example paradigm, children manipulate colored blocks on the screen to specify desired behavior via concrete changes. Based on these inputs, our system synthesizes generalized rules based on color. We give a brief overview of our current prototype, then share insights gleaned from two intergenerational co-design sessions with children and discuss implications for designers of similar systems.