Abstract:
As communities plan for a sustainable future, they may consider elementary students, as
the next generation of citizens, to be an ideal audience for placemaking efforts. This creative
project uses local history and storytelling elements to cultivate place attachment among
elementary students in Delaware County, Indiana. The creative process incorporates design
thinking strategies to facilitate collaboration with stakeholders from a local historical society and
a local elementary school to determine a practical project outcome. Emerging themes from
stakeholder sessions and academic literature form the parameters of the project; the ideal project
would have a playful approach, convey relevancy or meaning, include diverse representation,
and incorporate elements of storytelling, visual communication, tangibility, and interactivity. The
prototype, A Children’s Guide to Muncie & Delaware County, Indiana, combines these themes
with local history resources in a tourist-style guidebook to connect local elementary students in
third, fourth, and fifth grade to their hometowns and encourage an interest in the history and
pride points of the community. A mid-fidelity prototype was created with placeholder content to
demonstrate how a guidebook may be structured to represent multifaceted aspects of the
community, incorporate local history stories, and use visual design elements to create appeal for
an elementary audience. Feedback from the project partner indicates that the concept, format,
and design are promising as a template but further development is needed to determine the focus
and specific content to include. This creative project demonstrates how communities can use
history as a tool to develop and share the local identity of a place and its people to its youngest
citizens.
