Javascript must be enabled to continue!
PolyCIVIS Handbook on Participatory Methodsfor Teaching about the Polycrisis in Higher Education
Online full text edition of the handbook
Table of Contents
Prologue The PolyCIVIS Initiative for Polycrisis
Chapter 1 Gamification elements
Chapter 2 Serious play / playful design techniques
Chapter 3 Playful brainstorming techniques
Chapter 4 Lateral and visual thinking techniques
Chapter 5 Thick participation techniques
Chapter 6 Thin participation techniques
Chapter 7 Embodied participation techniques
Chapter 8 Arts-based participation techniques
Chapter 9 Making-based participation techniques
Chapter 10 Data-based participation techniques
Chapter 11 Cognitive style-based peer reflection / role-play approaches
Chapter 12 The JRC Polycrisis Exploration Workshop
Chapter 13 Challenge-based education approaches
Chapter 14 Service-learning education approaches
Take the Online Survey
for this Chapter Now!
Chapter 2
Participatory teaching for the polycrisis in Higher Education using: Serious play / playful design techniques
Preamble

This Chapter is part of the PolyCIVIS Handbook on Participatory Methods for Teaching about the Polycrisis in Higher Education. The objective of this Handbook is to serve as a reference resource for teaching about the polycrisis in Higher Education in a participatory manner, a need which has not only been foreseen by the PolyCIVIS project in its inception phase, but also confirmed and further substantiated in a number of meetings and workshops during the project’s lifetime.

This Handbook is not a coursebook to teach what the polycrisis is, but a methods book, to provide instruments for teaching about the polycrisis in a participatory manner. It is to be made available online as a multimedia live resource, presenting different participatory teaching methods for uptake by the Polycrisis-interested community in Higher Education, together with supporting materials such as method descriptions, references, examples and case studies.

The different methods proposed are presented in one chapter for each group of methods, which also includes, in the digital edition of this Handbook, a live survey to collect peer feedback from the community itself, on the usefulness and ease of use that community members (Higher Education tutors, students, researchers as well as practitioners) may themselves find specific methods to have within, and for, their own contexts and audiences.

What do we mean by thin participation techniques?

Serious play and playful design techniques use structured play, objects, images, metaphors, storytelling and model-building to support deep thinking, participation and collaborative sense-making. In higher education, serious play is used as a serious method for exploring complexity, uncertainty, conflict and imagination. In the context of teaching the polycrisis, playful design techniques can help students externalise assumptions, build shared system models, represent stakeholders, rehearse futures and discuss emotionally difficult topics through concrete artefacts.

Indicative starter sources for information about these methods
  • SAP Scenes - Every great experience starts with a great story: Collaborative storyboarding method for designing scenarios, user journeys, services and future experiences.
  • SAP Mosaic - Give Space to Creativity: Participatory method for prototyping creative workspaces and exploring relationships between behaviour, collaboration and physical space.
  • Playmobil Pro: Uses figurines, objects and visual scenes to model roles, relationships, organisational processes and social situations.
  • LEGO - Serious Play: Facilitated method using LEGO® bricks, metaphor-building, storytelling and shared reflection to explore complex problems.
  • Object-based playful facilitation: General approach using physical objects to help participants think, speak, negotiate and imagine together.
Additional sources of information about these methods
Indicative participatory teaching scenarios for these methods

Scenario 1. Build the polycrisis system

Students use bricks, objects, cards or figurines to build a physical model of interacting crises: climate change, displacement, food insecurity, public health, energy instability and democratic distrust. Each student explains one element of the model. The group then connects individual models into a shared system and identifies leverage points.

Scenario 2. Stakeholder scene rehearsal

Using SAP Scenes, Playmobil Pro or simple paper characters, students create scenes showing how different stakeholders experience a crisis intervention. Characters may include students, migrants, local authorities, hospitals, journalists, elderly residents, activists and non-human actors such as rivers or forests. The class discusses who benefits, who is ignored and what consequences emerge.

Scenario 3. Future campus mosaic

Students imagine the university campus as a polycrisis-resilient space in 2035. Using SAP Mosaic logic, they prototype learning spaces, care spaces, energy practices, emergency communication points and community partnerships. The activity helps students connect physical space, institutional behaviour, social justice and sustainability.

Scenario 4. Crisis artefact storytelling

Each group receives a random object, such as a key, bottle, toy, cable, map or mask. They must reinterpret it as an artefact from a future shaped by the polycrisis. The object becomes a prompt for storytelling, systems thinking and ethical reflection about possible futures.

Scenario 5. Playful policy prototyping

Students use miniatures, cards and paper templates to prototype a policy response to a fictional emergency. They build the policy as a scene rather than only writing it as text. Other groups “walk through” the scene, identify risks and suggest redesigns.

prev Previous chapter
Back to chapter list
Next chapter next
Take the Online Survey for this Chapter Now!

Please help us with your voluntary participation in this survey, to enrich this chapter with more views and ideas on the participatory methods reported for teaching about the Polycrisis in Higher Education. Your responses will be collected, stored securely, and used only for research purposes. Data will be analyzed and reported in anonymized form. Otherwise, the legal basis for processing your personal data is your explicit consent, in accordance with Article 6(1)(a) of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). You may withdraw at any time without penalty. You have the right to access, correct, or request deletion of your data. For questions or data requests, please contact polycivis@ulb.be. By proceeding, you confirm that: you are at least 18 years old; you understand the information above; and you voluntarily consent to participate in this survey and to the processing of the following data: a) first and last name, email address, and institutional affiliation, for potential follow-up regarding survey results and related activities of the Handbook b) status and region, for statistical purposes only.

*
*
*
*
* You are responding as:
(This information is used for statistical purposes only, to help balance respondents across regions and status)
* You are responding from an institution/organization in:
(This information is used for statistical purposes only, to help balance respondents across regions and status)
1. What would you think of using these methods/approaches within scenarios of participatory teaching about the polycrisis in higher education?
* Would you think that they would be useful to apply?
(please tick one option only)
* Would you think that they would be easy to apply?
(please tick one option only)
2. Would you have any more specific ideas about how to apply these methods/approaches, or any comments about their advantages and/or limitations?
*
(1,000 characters max)


* Consent:

Get New Code
[Get New Code]

* Fill in the code as it appears in the image

PolyCIVIS is a 3 year project starting from October 2023. It is funded by the European Union, Erasmus call: ERASMUS-JMO-2023-NETWORKS-HEI-NON-EU-AFRICA

Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

PolyCIVIS

Confronting the Polycrisis in Europe and Africa through Research, Policy and Education

The PolyCIVIS Polycrisis Handbook

Created By

styletts