How Should Our City Be Designed?
A recent article described the ways in which many cities are not child-friendly, examining some of the possibilities for designing cities around urban children and their needs and desires. It led me to think about ways to engage children in thinking about their environments and imagining the elements of what would be in their views an ideal city.
One approach would start with children considering their neighborhoods, which are smaller and more approachable spaces than trying to think about an entire city. Ask the children to draw pictures of their neighborhoods, making the drawings as detailed as possible. Then, for 3rd or 4th grade students and older, ask them to look at their completed drawings and make two lists, one list the things they most like about their neighborhoods and the other the things they like least.
Have the students share, in groups or as one large group, their drawings and thoughts, and, for the older students, their lists.
Next, ask the students to draw pictures of what their neighborhoods would look like if they could design them. Again, ask them to make these drawings as detailed as possible. Then have them share these drawings and engage in a discussion about the most important things an ideal neighborhood would include. Some questions you might ask include:
- What makes a neighborhood a good neighborhood?
- What public features would you want your neighborhood to have (for example, accessible bus routes, subways, parks, recreations centers, play spaces, museums, sidewalks, open spaces)?
- What types of homes and businesses would you want there to be?
- How would you prefer to get around your neighborhood and city? Would you like to be able to walk, skateboard, bike, take public transportation, or be driven around?
- What is the most important thing a good neighborhood should have?
If desired, this activity could then move into a larger scale project involving designing a child-friendly city, and perhaps to some local advocacy around these issues.
