STARTING INDUSTRIAL DESIGN EDUCATION OF THE AMATEUR DESIGNERS Nigan Bayazıt Özgür Uşaklıgil Oya Şenocak Secil Şatır Department of Industrial Product Design, Faculty of Architecture, Istanbul Technical University, Taskisla Taksim, 80191 Istanbul, Turkey, Phone: 90-212-293-1310/2243 Fax: 90- 212-251-4895 E-mail: bayazit@sariyer.cc.itu.edu.tr Keywords: design education, curriculum design, theory and application, design cognition. Abstract Objectives of the first year curriculum of industrial design education are to teach learning how to learn, problem identification, and solution finding at the beginning of the industrial design education. The overall curriculum aims at the integration of four sub-disciplinary domains, which are labelled as engineering, management of innovation, form giving, product and systems ergonomics. The problems of teaching industrial design for the first year are put forward in relation to the problems with the high school education. Industrial design education problems in Turkey has been analysed and criticised starting from the preparation stage of the entrance examinations to the university education. The purpose of giving design presentation skills to the students is explained who had no opportunity to get these skills in their secondary education. The ways students are asked to represent their thoughts by using the design languages, in a designerly manner are explained. The industrial design education equips students for a world that places a high value on the quality of human interactions. Two diverse approaches in five years time for industrial design education are criticised. In the first course organisation of the department, the first year education is considered for learning the basic knowledge to start industrial design. It is difficult for the students to identify the concept of industrial design by themselves in this course organisation. In the new course organisation, coordination is established between the theoretical courses and the studio applications. Teaching method of the foundation course bases on to the realisation of gradually increasing individual frames of the real world. This includes the development of the professional concepts. The basic items of the curriculum organisation are explained such as design theory and concept formation, visualisation in design, language of design, industrial design as an applied art, design theories and ways of thinking to design, design cognition, learning design apprenticeship. Teaching approaches of the existing world to how to perceive, investigate, structure, judge, explain and interpret the real world by themselves are explained. Introduction Design education for the beginners to the industrial design (ID) profession is a crucial task for the educators. "Beginners to any one of the design professions generally have a limited perspective of the profession, the world of artificial and causes behind the artificial. The education in this respect brings the student meet with the universe of design. The universe of design does not exist without the perceptual as well as knowledge amplitude of the students. Although we can say that the real world only "exist" for the subject or with the approval of the subject. In this case, we can say that subject dictates his or her principles to the real world (Bayazit, 1993)". Psychological as well as social frustration of the students in a new social setting make the task of the educators more difficult. ID educators have spent much of the time in the last two decades trying to define the nature of this stage and to establish a firm basis for the beginning of a curriculum. It is time to turn to the teaching and learning issues of the beginners. Industrial design tutors in many parts of the world encounter with this issue. For many of the