Game for play
Christabel is poised to contribute to society with her passion for design
Thanks to edUstarz, an integrated learning resource designed by Christabel Goh Mei Hsien, who graduated from NUS School of Design and Environment (SDE) with a Bachelor of Arts in Industrial Design (Honours) on 7 July, parents can soon look forward to a multifaceted toy that develops children's fine motor skills, imparts conceptual learning and improves language literacy.
Christabel's graduation project, edUstarz was conceived for children three to six years old. It boasts an IKEA-like instruction manual, a wooden cubic design with triangle, square, circle and rectangle cut-out panels, and thematic activity cards with vibrant pictures teaching a variety of concepts like characteristics of ocean animals and alphabets, all enclosed in a neat packaging.
Christabel demonstrating how edUstarz that promotes integrated learning through play, works
Other than encouraging parent-child or teacher-child bonding, the learning resource exercises finger muscles and strengthen wrists which enhance children's motor skills and penmanship, according to Christabel, who spent about five months on research.
"Children get restless rather easily and they will feel bored if they see learning as a chore, but not if they see it as play, so that is what I set out to do, said the 23-year-old graduate who had spent hours feverishly polishing up her product design for children to learn concepts and develop fine motor skills through play, in the design studio.
Her design process was aided by her part-time teaching experience to preschoolers since junior college.
"What inspired me was my time giving private education ─ I got to experience the difficulties faced when teaching certain concepts in language, mathematics or science to children, and the lack of suitable learning resources in the market to address these difficulties, explained Christabel.
Developed in collaboration with PCF Sparkletots Kindergarten and Nurtury In Enrichment Centre, Christabel produced many prototypes, finetuning her design based on feedback from educators and parents. She also tested her product on children.
edUstarz is currently undergoing further development with SDE's Design Incubation Centre and Christabel is keen to license her product to international toy retailers and educational centres.
The up-and-coming designer also developed an interactive spelling Kinect game which enables children to learn spelling creatively through kinaesthetic learning styles – this game was displayed at the National Museum of Singapore and Art Science Museum. It was awarded "Games for a purpose category winner at Human Computer Interaction Conference, Association for Computing Machinery's CHI 2015.
Her design portfolio also showcases her diversity ─ from preschool learning resource to food packaging to visitor gallery design. She was recently featured in Business Times for designing a nifty takeaway food container called Tabaoware - marrying tabao, a Mandarin term for "takeaway with the international brand Tupperware, which is famous for its durable and well-designed food containers.
Tabaoware allows hassle-free storage, microwave heating and consumption of various types of Asian food, especially noodle soup
Christabel who also loves sketching and landscape photography, spoke about her decision to pursue Industrial Design. "In Industrial Design, I am given opportunities to collaborate with highly valued and recognised industry players to work on projects that have widened my perspectives and helped me gain invaluable exposure to the working world, she said. "I want to make a positive difference through my designs, for a cause or for different groups of people.
Meanwhile, edUstarz has already clinched her a job offer – with the Singapore Polytechnic's User Experience Centre which works on a variety of design projects.
Commencement 2015 takes place from 6 to 24 July 2015, with a total of 10,219 graduates receiving their degrees over 23 ceremonies. Click here for more on Commencement 2015, including a live webcast of each ceremony.
