Design Forge keynote speaker and editor of the Little Book of Joy set to present “Together by Design: Joy, Community, & Forging Better Worlds.”
Opening keynote speaker for Design Forge, Dartmouth Associate Professor and Founding Co-Director of the Design Initiative at Dartmouth Eugene Korsunskiy will present “Together by Design: Joy, Community, & Forging Better Worlds” at Design Forge on March 27.
The workshop is based on The Little Book of Joy, a crowdsourced collection of resources that started during Design Forge at Elon University in March 2024. Korsunskiy says that joy is an important catalyst of — not a distraction from — the rigorous work of teaching and learning.
“Collected [in this little book] are lots of little ideas for how we can all infuse a little more joy into our work,” Korsunskiy said. “Each idea describes an activity that comes from an educator who has tried it in their classroom. These are things we can do to make ourselves feel joyful [and] things we can do to make others feel joyful.”
Pulling ideas from literature that focuses on humor and positive psychology thirty-six activity cards explain benefits and provide tips to get the most out of the activities. Check out the book here: http://bit.ly/joy-cards
“A growing body of research [shows] that joy helps with focus, creativity, problem-solving, teamwork, perseverance in the face of challenges, and so much more,” Korunskiy said. “By inducing the release of ‘happy hormones,’ activities and environments that spark joy have significant cognitive benefits for learners.”
Inspired by this year’s Pre-Forge Design Read, Relationality: An Emergent Politics of Life Beyond the Human, participants will consider how joy is a foundational element of design in community, and explore how people can prepare themselves, students, and communities for the important work of collaboratively designing brighter futures.
You can register to attend the opening keynote online. Registration for all Forge sessions can be seen on the website.