User talk:FLEM/Analysis of sessions

[Steve's notes in bold and in square brackets]

[Please note this are just SUGGESTIONS :-)

[You say in your Zulip note "I have no idea on how to transform this in a chapter, hope you’ll help me with it." I always thought that the issue is to make sure that the streams of workflow are separate from each other, so that 

(1) the descriptions of the aims and objectives of the workshops and the reflection your findings are distinct from 

(2) the workshops themselves, which I think you want to be playful and free. 

I think there is a lot of material here. You provide the draft for an introduction and outline the workflow so far; it's evident that you are generating a lot of primary research and you are using the workshops as a platform for reflection.
Looking at what you have made already (which is a fantastic start), the thesis could take the form of a workshop manual. This would take the reader through the process, and would allow you to play illustrate the process  (with visuals &c) and play  with the form. Each chapter could take the form of a session and lead the reader through your methods and in so doing describe your motivations. I think if you establish a structure at the start you will give yourself a lot of room to play with the form. Below I suggest a basic structure (or scaffold) and then edit some of the material you have on this page to sketch out that structure (we can discuss this on Thursday).

Session one

practical workshop

findings

resources

session two

practical workshop

findings 

Resources &c]

[Please note that in the section I have pasted below you are setting out your stall; explaining your methods and motivations clearly. you also introduce the reader to the idea of levels of engagement. This works because it is applied to the practical application within a workshop. It might be fun to adopt a mildly didactic mode of address which emphasises the 'thinking as doing' approach. Maybe the voice close to that of a yoga teacher or fitness coach might be fun to adopt.]

SKETCH

Session one

Hello everyone, glad you could make it to this first session of [title?]. 

Over the past year, I have been researching paper notebooks and on how we use them for our thinking and learning process.
Last year I started questioning my own notebooks practice and tried to build a new paper device that would satisfy better the needs of my brain in that moment. 

[show examples]

To get there I asked myself what were the problems in the device I was using and how changing something small could already improve my use of the notebook. I then wondered: "Why are we all using a device with the same structure? And what impact does it have on our learning, thinking and living, as well as on the imaginary of self? And how creating our personal tools would help users to understand better themselves and their needs?".[Could the notebook be understood as a technology of self? A technology which frames subjectivity?>]

I am interested in notebooks as a means of creativity, a space for thinking and reasoning, a personal world inside this messy world we live in. I like the idea of getting lost in our own space, how writing and doodling and drawing become part of our lives. And, I wonder, can this personal world be the same for everyone, can it be standardised? My theory is that everyone, in different situations, has different needs while using a notebook and that the efficiency (in the sense of: how much we use it, how useful it becomes for us, how we feel free and comfortable with it) can change using different structures.

This is what gave me the idea (show my notebooks' evolution): a normal notebook of which I just folded the sheets to create this multiple columns paper item. In my case I built it from scratch, but there are also options to work on the ones you already have, if you’d like so. At some point I needed to reorganise thoughts and I made this little prototype (show grad proj little notebook).

Creativity levels: (from the book Convivial toolbox)

I frame this workshop by understanding entry into the notebook [as a technology of the self] on four levels.
1)The most basic level of creativity is doing, that requires a minimum amount of interest. This is what happens when we use our already made from the industry notebook [which require a low entry level and we can still get results].

2)The second level is adaptation. This action is made to personalise and change in a little way an object you already have. If you brought your personal notebook today, you could try to improve it but making little additions to it, like a back pocket, a taped new paper, post-its to create more space.

3)The third level is making. This happens when we build a notebook from scratch but following predetermined patterns or rules. This action needs more time and energy.

4)The last level is creating. Creating is making something that doesn't exist yet. It relies on the use of raw materials and the abscense of predermined patterns.

Everyone can decide at what level they feel like engaging with their own notebook. The purpose of this sessions is to engage with further levels of creativity and explore how to make the notebook better fit your needs.

(Here I would like you to pause and consider how notebooks produce knowledge - do you do it? if you do it, how? if not, why? [this might be an opportunity to unpack some theory into this space])

I don’t know if you already use notebooks frequently or if you’d like to do so, and I hope that we'll be able to discover this here together during this session.

I'd like us to go through a few little exercises to get into the process of ideas and see how it goes. Later, we will make a notebook ourselves.

I’m here to guide you so whatever you’re level of bookmaking is, you will be able to create something today.

Do not overthink, it's not right or wrong, just do what comes to your mind.

We are going to do three short exercises to explore possibilities. You don't need to read what you write, you're invited to share but you're not obliged. Just free your mind. This is experimental. Whatever you'll make is good.

findings: reflections on what happened, expected and unexpected outcomes

resources: [here more theoretical issues can be unpacked. e.g.:] Technology of The Self is a term coined by Michel Foucault....

C.E.S. content

1. Organise sessions with people of different ages, backgrounds, bubbles, experience..

2. Work with associations to produce ideas and provoke creativity.

Type of sessions:

[ ] Collective sessions (5 to 8 people)

[ ] Individual sessions (1:1)

[ ] Follow-up sessions (both individual or collective)

[ ] Couples's sessions (two people working together)

Possible locations:

[ ] WORM (Zine's events)

[ ] CultureHub

[ ] DeBoeg

[ ] Research station WDKA

General overview (where am I at the moment)

The first three sessions I organised were “talking” sessions and it was a really good start in the sense that in that point of the research it was me deepen into this new topic trying to understand if people could start thinking about this type of things, if they use notebooks, how they interact with them, and seeing their interest sparkling was really nice. But obviously everything we talked about was still really abstract but I think it was a big it demonstrated me that having the making part as part of the learning, compulsory in my sessions, realised how much the practice and making is important to be included in this sessions. I have been writing a lot about how much it’s important to bring together making with thinking reasoning and learning but actually doing it and seeing it in practise that what I imagined is true it is even more revelling and strong, it gives even much more power to the project, to how much making can help discover things.

Analysis of sessions

Session 1. M&Ms XPUB

Environment: XPUB bubble; people that know my work and had the same influences in the last year.

Organisation of the session:

What will I say and how the session is structured

Helloooo everyone and welcome to this first M&Ms session. What I prepared for you is not what could be called a workshop, but more like an collaborative exploration session. I mostly have only questions and not so many answers or solutions, that is why I need you all.

This exploration sessions will serve my research about notebooks, annotation systems and dynamics: what I am trying to achieve is analysing, understanding and improving notebook systems to create personalised methodologies and tools. This sessions are meant for everyone who takes notes or draw, that uses paper or not, in every way. I would like participants to produce their personal notebook because we are all different and with diverse needs, so an object like a notebook, that we use everyday, cannot be standardised. And what is there more personal than something that you can make with your hands, at your own pleasure?

On the table you can see some pink questions: I would like you to temporary choose one of them and keep it in front of you. In addition, I made a little selection of sheets of paper for you: again, I would like you to pick the one you feel like satisfies you the most and keep it with you during the session. You can do whatever you want with it, fold it, write on it, or just keep it in your hands during the session and start reasoning on it and its spaciality while we talk. I asked you to bring your notebook because I would like to start questioning, all together, the limits of this device. By using as starting points the printed questions, I would like to go through an analysis of the notebooks, what are the characteristics, the limits, questioning what you notice in your way of writing, annotating, how you use it, why you use it, or why you cannot use it so much. While discussing together, the idea is to come out of this session with an idea for the construction of the “(un)perfect” notebook, that you will start working on in another session, later, or in the studio. I am always available for consultation.

Inspirational questions for participants…

1.How do you take notes/draw/doodle/think? What kind of interface do you use?

2.What is kept/lost in the process of annotation?

3.Do you use lines or plain paper? pen or pencil?

4.Do you have different notebooks for different purposes? Which ones?

5.What do you do when a notebook is finished?

6.Do you think your notebook could still say something/be useful for some reason?

7.How much taking notes is involved in the process of learning for you?

8.Are there problems you might have while using your notebook? It can be limitation of the means, structure of it..etc

9.Have you ever thought about using a notebook that could fit better your needs?

10.Do you ever think like I would like to continue on this notebook but it’s finished? I would like to keep these pages also in the next notebook?

11.Do you think you might like to use the notebooks by sections and not by order of the pages? With separations or maybe color differentiation to start writing also in the middle of it? So you don’t have to start from a big blank first page but from a random or not so random point inside the notebook where everything will be gathered together? Do you feel like needing categories and sections? What if one section finishes then?

Results

"on notebooks and annotation systems"

to think about for next sessions

• answering all the questions everyone
• give/take some time to think
• explain my thoughts and ideas before the start so they know what we are talking about and get some context
• underline that every answer is useful, using notebooks to understand humans' brains

new ideas

• Collective notetaking on paper
• memory extension
• notebooks show what you experienced in that period of time (subjective experience)
• community memory = social function
• policy of craft, notebooks making as craft
• craftmanship: you think about the surroundings, the skills you need, the tools you use the time of creation etc..
• how to make your personal archive of memory? → the memory castle

new questions

• Has anyone ever intentionally thrown away a notebook?
• What to do if you don't finish all the sheets in a notebook?
• Do you take notes to keep or to let go things?
• What is the difference in use between apps/notebooks? What do you write on them?
• Why to have a record that is contraddictory to the actual experience?
• Why do we use notebooks?

from participants

[ ]

• Soft-cover
• anxiety from messy notebooks, don't wanna play with the notebook
• NEED line-paper, calendar and space for notes
• nice soft paper + perfect pen
• page with sticky notes to use for no-set things
• needs to be big enough
• must stay flat
• NO stream of consciousness
• YES anchor points
• what get lost when organising/moving thoughts from brain to written material?

[ ]

• smoothest paper to prevent myself from hesitating because of no friction
• don't like to have already made cover
• notebooks from teenage years: I would neglect and let it sink
• need for personal space, use notebooks to create a personal space

[ ]

• I forget things so it's helpful to remember, to centralise thoughts and let space for more things
• plain sheets
• hard cover not to break them
• separate notebooks for different needs
• to let go stuff and stop thinking

[ ]

• pocket size notebook to bring it everywhere
• used to describe an entire experience
• sticky notes for temporary thoughts
• flexible, has dots for concepts and reflexions

[ ]

start motivated then forget about the notebook

[ ]

I keep them but I don't look back

Notebooks to experience the world, not to keep track

Notebooks as defence, to feel protected

to participate in a different world

to let things out

[ ]

• lot of layers
• start multiple notebooks at the same time
• when it's new, the content is selected
• sticky notes for temporary thoughts
• other archives/papers, content is distributed everywhere
• scattered around
• use them to visualise, it's about what it's happening right now
• not attached to one tool
• site-specific notebook
• time-based notebook

references

https://pzwiki.wdka.nl/mediadesign/Politics_of_Craft

https://www.artistsandhackers.org/Community-Memory

https://computerhistory.org/blog/community-memory-precedents-in-social-media-and-movements/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zettelkasten

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palimpsest

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talmud

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottom's_Dream

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folio

http://georgemaciunas.com/essays-2/improving-education-in-the-world-based-on-maciunas-knowledge-management-and-learning-machine-system-by-astrit-schmidt-burkhardt/

Roland Brothers around notula and nota

Session 2. Leeszaal

Environment: XPUB bubble, that has similar interests and research questions, as well as research methods, but a bit more open as they are not all studying with me.

Session 3. Individual session with Clara

Environment: a person that studied with me in the past but we went through different directions. Still in the artistic bubble though that can definitely be perceived throughout the session.

Different notebooks for different purposes: C gives names and date of birth and death to her different notebooks.

[ ] Important thoughts and sketches

C: I use it less than before

E: Do you know why?

C: What if i draw something and it's not nice? After I have drawn it then I have to keep it there, inside my notebook and the notebook is ruined with bad drawings.

C: I compare the pages to see if they are all beautiful.

CREATIVE SOLUTION: Making collages to fill in the spaces that I left while moving on in the notebook.

[ ] Self-structured bullet journal

It's a blank notebook on which C creates the different sections, drawing them and organising them as she feels like

C: I like to browse through it like a notebook therapy

[ ] C: started many journals for example to make it more funny to take medications, where I make cute drawings and doodles that refer to my "obligation

[ ] Weekly planner to remember things

entire week in one page

pages with lines

CREATIVE SOLUTION: taping on the pages paper inserts so I can use blank paper and write how I want, as the lines create limitations in my thinking

[ ] C: I have a notebook for a podcast I am working on

I use lines only when I have to write everything aligned and organised

I skim the ideas in my head first, or talking, and then I write down when I have a precise idea or keywords I am sure about.

[ ] Sudden ideas: on her phone

Problems/hates:

[ ] Anxiety of blank pages

[ ] What to do with the back side of paper I have written on? Waste of paper.

[ ] Ripped pages.

CREATIVE SOLUTION: glue one page on the top of the other

[ ] Squared format

Make your own tool 1.0 - 22.11.22

Organisation of the session

Introduction (10 minutes)

Hello

I’m working on a research about paper notebooks, or more widely note taking devices, and on how we use them for our thinking and learning process.

This is an ongoing research, therefore, I do not have all the answers that also makes all of this really exciting and I hope these sessions, that I hope will continue, are a space for both you and me to explore and discover new things.

(theory) Last year I started questioning my notebook's practice and tried to build a new paper device that would satisfy better the needs of my brain in that moment. To get there I asked myself what were the problems in the device I was using and how changing something small could already improve my use of the notebook. I then wondered: "Why are we all using a device with the same structure? And what impact does it have on our learning, thinking and living, as well as on the imaginary of self? And how creating our personal tools would help users to understand better themselves and their needs?".

I am interested in notebooks as a means of creativity, a space for thinking and reasoning, a personal world inside this messy world we live in. I like the idea of getting lost in our own space, how writing and doodling and drawing become part of our living. And, I wonder, can this personal world be the same for everyone, can it be standardised? My theory is that everyone, in different situations, has different needs while using a notebook and that the efficiency (in the sense of: how much we use it, how useful it becomes for us, how we feel free and comfortable with it) can change using different structures.

(practice) This is what gave me the idea (show my notebooks' evolution): a normal notebook of which I just folded the sheets to create this multiple columns paper item. In my case I built it from scratch, but there are also options to work on the ones you already have, if you’d like so. At some point I needed to reorganise thoughts and I made this little prototype (show grad proj little notebook).

Creativity levels: (from the book Convivial toolbox)

The most basic level of creativity is doing, that requires a minimum amount of interest. This is what happens when we use our already made from the industry notebook.

The second level is adapting. This action is made to personalise and change in a little way an object you already have. If you brought your personal notebook today, you could try to improve it but making little additions to it, like a back pocket, a taped new paper, post-its to create more space.

The third level is making. This happens when we build a notebook from scratch but following predetermined patterns or rules. This action needs more time and energy.

The last level is creating. Creating is making something that doesn't exist yet. It relies on the use of raw materials and the abscense of predermined patterns.

Everyone can decide at what level they feel like engaging with their own notebook. The purpose of this sessions is to engage with further levels of creativity and explore how to make the notebook fit better your needs.

(ask about notebooks making knowledge - do you do it? if you do it, how? if not, why?)

I don’t know if you already use notebooks frequently or if you’d like to do so, and I hope that we'll be able to discover this here together during this session.

The idea is going through a few little exercises to get into the process of ideas and see how it goes. Later, we will make a notebook ourselves.

I’m here to guide you so whatever you’re level of bookmaking is, you will be able to create something today.

Do not overthink, it's not right or wrong, just do what comes to your mind.

We are going to do three short exercises to explore possibilities. You don't need to read what you write, you're invited to share but you're not obliged. Just free your mind. This is experimental. Whatever you'll make is good.

PART 1 - 3 get-into-practice exercises

EXERCISE 1. (5 minutes)

Questions in layers

1) Do you use notebooks?

2) List a few situations in which you use notebooks.

3) Describe what do you like or dislike about your notebook.

EXERCISE 2. (5 minutes)

prepare 3 sheets of paper of same size and give them in different rounds of 5 minutes

1) Fold the first paper. Give it to the person next to you.

2) Fold a second paper. Give it to the person next to you.

3) Fold a third paper. Give it to the person next to you.

4) Put these sheets together, where the binding in these foldings could be positioned?

EXERCISE 3. (5 minutes)

prepare 3 different sizes of paper and give them in different rounds of 5 minutes

1) From answer 2, pick one situation in which you use a notebook.

2) Write something about what needs you have in that situation on this paper. You are allowed to fold the paper to make it more comfortable for you.

3) Write again something (or the same thing) about what needs you have in that situation on this paper. You are allowed to fold the paper to make it more comfortable for you.

4) Write again something (or the same thing) about what needs you have in that situation on this paper. You are allowed to fold the paper to make it more comfortable for you.

Reflection round

Share if they have interesting observation.

How was it different to write to a different shape? Do you wanna share what you wrote?

Let's do a round.

---

[break of 10 minutes]

---

PART 2 - Make a notebook section (40 minutes)

Maybe you can now think about a notebook for a specific scenario and think about a format that could fit. Pick what you need and build a prototype. This can be just the prototype to test a scenario, but if you end up liking it you can try to use it. Think about it a few minutes. If you have some ideas or problems you'd like to talk about, I’m here to guide you so whatever you’re level of bookmaking is, you will be able to create something today.

Exercise>>Make a notebook from a cardboard.

Importance of recycling materials: an important part of my practice is making notebooks by starting from already used materials. I brought today a few "book covers". I'd like you to start thinking about a prototype you could fit into one of these shapes/structures.

This will also help triggering our imagination. It can be as easy and simple as you can imagine, and you could also think if there’s a way to make it more adapt to you, helping yourself with the results of the exercises we just did.

Let’s start!

After the session. (10 minutes)

Ask 3 questions:/ conv/ let's do a round/ first time, feedbacks are welcome / if they have any thoughts in the next weeks or months or start making osmething invite them to share.

1) Did you like the session?

2) What would you change/What did you like?

what impact this workshop can have on this?

3) Would you participate in a follow-up session?

If so, leave your email address here:

Results

Introduction

We have been talking, I introduced the research, showed my notebook example and said that my work is on going, so I don-t have all the answers and I am also there to learn together with them. I said we would spend the session experimenting and learning from each other.

I forgot to present each other and what are we doing there, so remember next time to do a presentation round, asking about their bookbinding experience, and a super small overview of their use of notebooks.

PART 1 - 3 get-into-practice exercises

Then we did three exercises where I freed them from any fear of failing, accepting everything they would create (just be careful when I am in doubt if a modification on the exercise they might propose doesn’t disrupt the reason why the exercise exist, as with number 2).

1. In the first writing exercise I proposed I need to be more precise with the questions and find better ways to invite people to answer because they were a bit to straightforward, not giving a lot of space for interpretation and people were a bit confused. Another question to solve is how much time to give between the questions, should I wait that everyone finishes? just say 5 minutes and it's done?
2. The second exercise was really nice, because participants put their hands on things and they could actually perceive the different approach they had in what they were doing. They came up with a result that they did not expect and it was really exciting. They asked me if they could use glue and I said no because the purpose is that they had to find a way to make whatever paper they found themselves with in the form of a notebook, with a binding in whatever part they would decide. Here, remember not to rotate always in the same direction as I don't want only one person's foldings to mix together. Maybe one you keep, one right side, one left side.
3. The third exercise, I had to modify it on the go, while doing it because it got a bit boring because there were too many repetitions without new discoveries. Find different questions, could also use the foldings they made in exercise 2 to have the same feeling they had with the weird narrow paper. The solution I found made the exercise interesting because it created a reaction in them and in the way they were thinking about how they would normally approach pieces of paper when writing, because the paper they used was of an unusual shape.

Reflection round

Then we had a discussion when they could explain what were their thoughts and I could already see that they were already looking at things differently, especially thanks to exercise number 2.

[ ]

• Notebooks are always too big or too small
• like long lines

[ ] has different notes in different places, also digital

[ ]

• needs to be at 90 degrees
• the weird folds inspiring for drawings, not for notes because too messy
• like envelopes and foldings

[ ]

• crave for the format of a book
• need to be compact and stable
• if narrows help writing, so like columns and foldings

[ ]

• like to play around
• how to combine together? rip off bad pages to recombination them
• paper didn't allow flexibility

[ ]

• questions to the point
• write differently on the shape they made
• the shape changes the way I write
• vertical words in lines give me the urgency to let things out --> let's bind together the urgent notes

[ ] narrow paper for stream of consciousness and play like notebooks with columns

I still have problems in understanding how to document these impressions. I think they are visible in some way or another in their final notebooks but still, annotate on my notebook like this is enough?

PART 2 - Make a notebook section

In this section I asked them to make a notebook based on whatever came up to their minds while doing the exercises. It could be a basic standard notebooks, adding a small modification, doing experimental weird things, everything accepted.

The moment when we passed from the first section to the second was a bit too direct and not smooth so it would be nice to find a way to get into that section more smoothly. Or step by step. In this case we solved by asking them what size or shape they wanted the notebook could have. But it also means that every time it could be different, so for example if one time we focus more on paper then we could choose which type of paper we want to start with.

It was really nice to see that everyone reacted in their own way and if you look at the results they produced during the session you can really notice that they were not only making basic notebooks but they already played a little bit with the ideas that came out through the three exercises in the first part and it was much better then only talking that stays a bit in the abstract side of things.

After the session

At the end people finishes at different pace, depending on what they work on and it's difficult to find a moment back together to discuss because they are all into their work and do not really feel like talking. This time I did not manage to do more than a fast general question on how they felt and if they would come to follow/up sessions.

After the session I sent an email with pictures, some further information and a form with a few questions about the session. This is risky because not everyone then go and fill in the form.

General overview

• I need to prepare three or 4 different bookbinding methods so whatever shape or structure they propose I can help them properly. Also prepare different papers so they can also play with that part, maybe having an exercise specifically on this.
• It was interesting to see that I managed to make this session not on bookbinding, but it would be nice to organise another session where people can focus on type of binding they can use to have a bigger overview of the possibilities. Maybe prepare a presentation on this. Second session to be organised after a period of incubation where they can feel the thoughts directly in their living.
• It was extremely nice to see them doing the exercises and get excited when they saw things happening. It is really good that they could create their own things with their hands.
• I really enjoyed the time together and I think that they also had a lot of fun, and this is also really important for me.
• I want to try out different exercises that can lead to similar concepts, to start thinking about this topics I am talking about. Starting from my questions and develop exercises directly from them.
• I need a bit more time, so maybe 2.5h or even 3h, but it is also tiring so I need to think about it a little bit.
• 8 people was a good number, but in the second part it was even a bit too many to be able to follow all of them properly. On the other side, this provoked an interesting result that was that everyone tried their best to be independent and found experimental ways to solve their problems, while sometimes asking for help when they did not know how to do it or could not go on with what they had in mind.
• Write for an exercise that helps them reasoning but that I can also keep with me after the session so it would be nice to ask questions that are related to the things I am looking for researching about.
• It was nice the part of the creativity creation stuff I introduced, it would be nice to have a super small theoretical concept to share with them while I go on with reading and researching.
• The exercises are not only made to get into the process or in the mindset I am looking for, but it really helps to get through the writing, in the same way I asked to answer my questions by talking with people, giving a context to it by doing it on paper and using that to create other exercises works really well.
• Possible structure of exercises:
  1. writing exercise where they answer something about the topic and at the same time start interacting with paper
  2. Exercise for the folding
  3. Exercise for the paper