Sketching snapshots: reflecting on human-computer interaction education through sketching

Reflection provides students and instructors insight into mindsets, learning progress, and course design. However, most reflective activities in HCI courses focus on specific skills and content. We propose sketching as a flexible and expressive medium for reflecting on larger topics to reveal implicit perspectives about multifaceted concepts of HCI. We developed “Sketching Snapshots,” an activity to elicit student perspectives on high-level concepts. To evaluate this activity, we ran pre- and post-semester workshops in two HCI courses in the US and UK. We analyze 68 sketches from 41 students, 9 student interviews, and 2 instructor interviews, and find that sketching is effective for supporting student and instructor reflection. We then report case studies in two additional contexts and synthesize recommendations for deploying reflective sketching. We propose incorporating Sketching Snapshots in courses can facilitate reflection on complex concepts, improve teaching, and spark conversations about what HCI means to us and our students.