Stimulating students in logical thinking and imagination through a new multi-analysis method - a Sino-Italian collaborative class experience

The Chinese “National Medium and Long-Term Educational Reform and Development Plan (2010-2020)” clearly stated: “Encourage schools at all levels to carry out various forms of international exchanges and cooperation, explore various ways to introduce high-quality foreign teaching resources, and improve exchanges level of cooperation”. Under this policy background, the Beijing University of Civil Engineering and Architecture (BUCEA) has carried out teaching and research cooperation with the Politecnico di Milano (POLIMI). This collaboration permitted to achieve remarkable results in discussing on Sino-European urban landscapes, resilient cities, landscape, and heritage protection also through the global identity authentication alliance EduGAIN, sharing high-quality educational resources via the digital resource platform “Cedation Network Federal Certification and Resource Sharing Infrastructure” (CARSI) combining for the first time the BUCEA’s “Landscape Architecture International Design Work Camp” course with POLIMI’s “Metabolism of City and Landscape” to jointly build a long-term professional “Collaborative Class” under the EU education model. The paper will focus on this first experimental course integrating further education and teaching systems. It mainly includes lectures by internationally renowned professors, block-based lectures, and heuristic dialogues. The joint course aims to stimulate POLIMI and BUCEA students to use logical thinking and imagination to explore a new multi-analysis method of the cultural landscape in theoretical study, design analysis and conceptual expression, tracing, translating, and imagining the concept of landscape design under different cultural backgrounds to appreciate the resilience of contemporary cities from multiple perspectives. As a method, BUCEA and POLIMI teachers propose to students a complete theory and case studies through the online teaching platform. On this basis, the multivariate analysis of landscape design concepts focuses on a “present-past-future” lens as a logical clue into four training steps: 1) Screening of landscape core words, 2) Etymology analysis, 3) Historical evolution, and 4) Future scenarios. The concept is that students can fully use their imagination to deduce the multi-layered connotation and different forms of change of core words in the future urban resilience development. Finally, using the film-by-learning method, students intuitively express their thoughts and exploration through dynamic images and record their learning feelings. The video learning method replaces the traditional sketching encouraging students to conduct multiple explorations of landscape design concepts through participatory processes such as commentary and analysis more perceptually and communicatively.