How to teach Web Design

The amount of things that web developers need to know in 2015 is vastly different from that in 2005. With Singapore actively promoting to be a “Smart Nation” and offering to teach more students “computational thinking” through basic HTML and programming courses in schools, how should one teach a student who know nothing about web design at all to think in a device-independent manner, using modern techniques such as responsive design and mobile first?

Because of the speed of technology advancement nowadays, the teaching curriculum today maybe totally obsolete next year. In other words, what the teachers in schools are teaching today is probably not applicable already.

So who should be the ideal teacher? Or rather, what kind of skills and experiences should the ideal teacher have? Since web design is a skill that needs to be practiced, it is best for students to learn while doing, and who else can let them do it other than an industry expert, one who has been developing websites professionally.

Yet such industry experts may not be teaching experts. It is entirely different for someone to excel in web design and also excel in teaching web design. What is important for students is the teaching methods of teachers, the interactions and the discussions between them.

If it is possible, get a combination of both, an industry expert who is also good at teaching. If not, perhaps get 1 teacher from each profile and have them facilitate the class. This will be the best type of teacher for teaching web design.

In a beginner web design class, which I am sure a few higher institutions in Singapore offer, such as School of Art, Design and Media in Nanyang Technological University (NTU), the students isare usually required to create website layouts using software such as photoshop, or sometimes, even hand drawn. The idea is to enable them to picture the web in their minds first without worrying about how the website will be coded. By removing code from the picture, students focus on design principles, including graphic design and user experience. They will understand what happens when their website is presented on a smaller screen such as that of a smart phone, not in code, but in design perspective.

As they progress on, start introducing some code, a little at a time and slowly make the examples more complex, start asking questions to the students along the way and target one aspect of web design at a time. For example, introduce the syntax for HTML in a few consecutive classes so that students will have a good basic understanding of HTML.

In conclusion, always remember you are not designing for a client, when it comes to web development and any other programming education, it is about letting students understand the process and logic behind it rather than expecting good quality design straight out of the class. If you are thinking of teaching a web design class, work out what you will want your curriculum to look like and what are the priorities.

Last but not least, you have to ignite their passion first. Good luck!