ABSTRACT
This chapter experiments with creative problem-solving (CPS) object-learning through play in the following design and planning applications: The Semiotic Diagram; Brainstorming; Design/Planning Intensives and Charrettes; Design/Planning Applications. They are used in the chapter as example applications for object-learning and play exercises and transferability to other facets of design and planning. Object-learning applies to all aspects of the CPS process, both in the intellectual/processing and sensory thinking components. Object-learning is a direct sensory or cognitive perception process, performed primarily through manual dexterity hence the use of play. Play can be the tipping point between linear data-gathering between data-gathering and analysis and an in-depth understanding of the relationships embedded within that data In the design fields and in particular in urban design and planning, diagrams are used to explore the organizational and structural relationships of the CST Matrix. In structural relationships, materials, their physical characteristics and methods of assembly are combined with context, environment and organizational relationships to form reality something made.
