The Story of All of Us

 ‘The Story of All of Us’ is a proposal for a co-created exhibition about the story of the universe.  Made by children and designers, it aims to address the issues of segregation and racism in Gothenburg. 

Gothenburg is becoming increasingly multicultural, but inequality and segregation are also growing. By creating tools to retell the story of the universe, the project proposes to join groups of children between 6 and 8 years old from two neighborhoods with social and economic different realities. Its main aim is, through a meaningful story of each and all of us, to reflect on sense of belonging and identity. The project approach combines participatory design and the maker movement. 

The project is divided in three parts: 
THE SCHOOL
THE WORKSHOPS
THE EXHIBITION

THE SCHOOL
Before the two groups of children meet to create the story, there is a phase of preparation that happens in the school, with the teachers. In this proposal, the workshops schemes were developed after conversations with a teacher of a pre-school in Lundby, Gothenburg. The intention of these preparatory workshops were to be aligned with the school methods and routines and introduce the theme in an environment known by the children.  

THE WORKSHOPS
The methods and the schedule of the activities for the workshops were inspired by a project called Kids, Museums and Technology Programme, from the Museum of Technology in Helsinki, Finland. I contacted the professionals who worked in this programme and they shared the method model that they had developed: “The Magic Carpet of Technology tales: an operational model of technological education for museum visitor activities and early educators” that at that time hadn’t been published.  
THE TOOLBOX: materials, devices, apps and programmes to be used in the workshops were defined after a workshop and discussion with Carl Heath, from RISE Interactive Gothenburg. Some of these tools were tested in rapid prototypes with children.

THE EXHIBITION
These were the drafts to create a physical platform that could be hosted by a museum. In this “spiral", the materials developed by the team children+designers during the workshops would be exhibited in a chronological story of the universe.