Teaching About and Through Human-Centered Design in Higher Education Classrooms: Exploring Instructors’ Experiences

In higher education settings, instructors play a critical role in integrating Human-Centered Design (HCD) in existing and new courses. This study explores how instructors teach about and through HCD in higher education settings and what challenges they encounter as they do so. Participants were four faculty members and four graduate teaching assistants from four different courses. The participants were interviewed after their course ended for the semester. A phronetic iterative analysis approach was used to analyze the transcribed interview data. Findings indicated that when teaching about and through HCD, instructors intentionally and purposefully plan to integrate HCD, implement targeted instructional strategies to scaffold students’ learning of disciplinary content and HCD concepts, provide multiple forms of assessment and feedback, and facilitate collaboration between students, peers, and classroom visitors for deeper engagement in learning. Nevertheless, teaching about and through HCD is challenging and requires further specific teaching competencies that can empower instructors to integrate HCD in their courses.