PROGRAM IDEAS

Career Day: Be an Architect or Interior Designer

• Use the Design Studio as the core of your program.
  
  
• Invite a local architect to speak briefly before students explore the Web site. Ask him or her to show program participants models, plans and other tools. Contact your local AIA chapter for contacts and other outreach opportunities.
  
  
• After completing the Design Studio, have each participant give the group a tour of his or her house. Encourage them to talk about the choices they made. Allow other participants to constructively critique the designs. Have the guest architect make encouraging comments.
  
  
• Invite the program participants back to the library for a hands-on activity such as making a model of their house.
  
  
• Extend the program to interior design and have the participants return to meet with a professional interior designer. Invite the interior designer to talk about how architecture influences design choices. Have the participants look at fabric samples, pictures in magazines, catalogs, etc., to come up with a design scheme for their Architect Studio 3D house. Create a challenge-type game where participants design a room in another participant's house. If time allows, have them develop a design scheme for their own bedrooms.

Design Challenge

• Focus on the aspect of satisfying the client's needs and make the activity a challenge. Score each design on how well your program participants met the client's needs. Have the participants score each other. Give prizes.

Local Architecture and History

• Have participants tour the Designing for People and Place section and give a brief talk on local architecture with illustrations. If possible, include a walking tour of buildings in the vicinity of the library, include examples of significant and historic architecture but also point out design features of "everyday" buildings and houses and how the location and function of the building might have influenced the design.
  
  
• Use the library building itself as an example of concepts laid out in Designing for People and Place. Discuss the history of the building and how the various functions of the library are served, or perhaps not served, by the building construction.

Living History

• Have an adult (or older teen) dress up like Frank Lloyd Wright and give a brief talk on his life and work. Create the script from the biographical information on the website. Guide participants through the Web site for illustrations of Wright-designed buildings.

Architecture Month Display

• Does your city or state have a designated Architecture Month? Make sure lots of books are available! Show participants the entry for 'architect' in the Occupational Outlook Handbook and other books on architecture as a career for young people. Include books on world and local architecture. For a list of suggested resources on Frank Lloyd Wright and the Prairie style of Architecture, go to www.wrightplus.org/programs/teacher.html.