Teaching parametric design: fostering algorithmic thinking through incomplete recipes

Abstract

PurposeAlgorithmic and computational thinking are necessary skills for designers in an increasingly digital world. Parametric design, a method to construct designs based on algorithmic logic and rules, has become widely used in architecture practice and incorporated in the curricula of architecture schools. However, there are few studies proposing strategies for teaching parametric design into architecture students, tackling software literacy while promoting the development of algorithmic thinking.Design/methodology/approachA descriptive study and a prescriptive study are conducted. The descriptive study reviews the literature on parametric design education. The prescriptive study is centered on proposing the incomplete recipe as instructional material and a new approach to teaching parametric design.FindingsThe literature on parametric design education has mostly focused on curricular discussions, descriptions of case studies or studio-long approaches; day-to-day instructional methods, however, are rarely discussed. A pedagogical strategy to teach parametric design is introduced: the incomplete recipe. The instructional method proposed provides students with incomplete recipes for parametric scripts that are increasingly pared down as the students become expert users.Originality/valueThe article contributes to the existing literature by proposing the incomplete recipe as a strategy for teaching parametric design. The recipe as a pedagogical tool provides a means for both software skill acquisition and the development of algorithmic thinking.

In search of rules for creative design process

“…However, different from previous discussions, the idea of a rule in algorithmic design thinking does not necessarily exist as an imposed rule, with specific design outcomes. Rather, the ruleset itself can be self-adapted and the outcomes can be open-ended and bottom-up depending on the design intention of the users (Vazquez, 2023). This change demonstrates a shift from applying rules as a set of accepted truths and rightness, into something that is contingent on forces around it (Till, 2013).…”

“…Other reviews towards the idea of rules of architecture annotate that rules do not work in more complex worlds when stakeholders of design do not share similar social values or means of communication, when the overall forms are inherently non-hierarchical or more dispersed instead of consisting of a bounded whole, and so on (Hillier & Hanson, 1989;Till, 2013). In addition, with the complexity of digital design learning, the difficulty lies in combining digital skills acquisition and algorithmic design thinking, (Vazquez, 2023). Such difficulty led the learning process to rely upon students "following standard blindly followed scripts and procedures" (Abdelmohsen & Massoud, 2021, p. 459).…”