Çocukların mekan algısı ve katılımcı tasarım yöntemlerinde rolü: Muş ve Harran yerleşimleri
Children's space perception and the role in participatory design methods:Muş and Harran settlements
Yazar: BAŞAK İNCEKARA
Danışman: DOÇ. DR. GÜLŞEN AYTAÇ
İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi / Fen Bilimleri Enstitüsü / Peyzaj Mimarlığı Ana Bilim Dalı / Peyzaj Mimarlığı Bilim Dalı
Derece: Yüksek Lisans, 2018
Konu: Peyzaj Mimarlığı = Landscape Architecture ; Şehircilik ve Bölge Planlama = Urban and Regional Planning

Özet:
Mekansal tasarım süreçlerinde çocuğun varlığı ve etkin rol alışı mekanın kalite
kriterleri adına büyük önem taşımaktadır. Bir mekan çocuklar için uygun tasarlandığı
zaman aslında birçok farklı grubun ortak yararına hizmet edebilir nitelikte
olmaktadır. Öte yandan sürekli değişen ve dönüşen mekanda geleceğin yetişkinleri
olarak bugünün çocuklarını dahil etmeden yapılacak müdahaleler eksik kalacaktır.
Çocuklar mekânsal anlamda ülkemizde birçok sorunla karşı karşıya kalmaktadır. Bu
sorunlar yaşanılan yerin kendi dinamiklerine göre değişiklik göstermekte ve her
yerde eşit yaşanan bir çocukluk deneyiminden bahsetmek mümkün olmamaktadır.
Çocukların mekan tasarım süreçlerine dahil olabilmeleri adına mekan ile kurdukları
ilişkinin, ihtiyaçlarının, sorunlarının anlaşılması gerekmektedir.
Yetişkinler ile çocuklarının deneyimledikleri mekan birbirinden farklılaşmaktadır.
Bu farklardan bir tanesi kullanım amacı ve şeklidir. Çocuk ile yetişkin aynı mekanı
farklı işlevler ve ihtiyaçlar üzerinden kullanmaktadır. Farklardan bir diğeri ise
ölçektir. Yetişkin ile çocuk arasındaki ölçek farkı mekânsal sınırlar anlamında,
mekanı algılamak anlamında, mekandaki hareketlilik anlamında etkili olmaktadır.
Mekandaki sınırlar fiziksel olarak karşımıza çıkabileceği gibi görünmez sınırlar
olarak da karşımıza çıkabilmektedir. Ancak görünmez sınırlar yine yetişkin ve çocuk
arasında farklılık göstermektedir. Yetişkinlerin normlar üzerinden kurdukları
görünmez sınırlar çocuklarda deneyime bağlı olarak gelişmektedir. Çocuklar mekanı
yetişkinlerden farklı kullanmaktadırlar.
Dolayısı ile günümüz çocuklarının mekânla nasıl ilişki kurduklarını ne tür mekânsal
ihtiyaçlarının olacağını yetişkinler ve profesyoneller olarak tahmin etmek ve mekan
tasarımına çocuk fikirlerini dahil etmek yetişkin bakış açısı ile mümkün değildir. Bu
noktada katılım kavramı ön plana çıkmaktadır.
Birleşmiş Milletler Çocuk Hakları Sözleşmesi eşitlik ilkesi ile 18 yaşına kadar bütün
bireyleri kapsayan hakları tanımlamaktadır. Katılım hakkı da sözleşmenin 12. Ve 13.
Maddelerinde açıkça ifade edilmektedir.
Günümüz mekan disiplinlerinde yapılan projeler incelendiğinde çocuk odaklı
çalışmaların kentlerde yoğunlaştığını görmekteyiz. Çocuk, kentlerde var olan
sorunlara yönelik çözüm getirmek amacı ile gerçekleştirilen projelerle ön plana
çıkmakla beraber piyasada üretilen projeler dahilinde de bir reklam değeri
taşımaktadır. Bu durum uygulama aşamasında katılımcı süreçlerin hem sürat hem de
maddi nedenler ile yüzeysel bir şekilde yapılmasına sebep olmakta ve katılımcı
tasarım anlam kaybına uğramaktadır. Bu durum katılımcı süreçlerin uygulanmasına
yönelik kriterlerin belirlenmesi gerekliliğini getirmektedir.
Kırsal mekanın ölçek, fiziksel sınırlar, hareketlilik anlamında kentsel mekanın
sağlayamadığı imkanları sağlaması çocukların kendi yaşam alanları ile çok daha
rahat iletişim kurmalarına imkan sağlamaktadır. Kırsal mekanda çocuklar
yetişkinlerden bağımsız bir kullanım ağına sahiptir. Bu durum özellikle katılımcı
tasarım bağlamında ve saha çalışması anlamında büyük bir avantaja dönüşmektedir.
Bu çalışma özellikle katılım hakkının mekânsal projeler dahilinde nasıl
uygulanabileceğine ilişkin kırsal mekanda bir deneyim birikimi yaratmaktadır.
Çalışma katılımcı tasarım içerisinde bir yöntem olarak oyunun 6-12 yaş grubu
çocuklar ile nasıl kullanılacağına ilişkin inceleme ve alan çalışması içermektedir.

Abstract:
To consider the presence and usage of children in the process of spatial design is
fundamentally important among the quality criteria of spaces. When a space is
designed based on considering the usage of children, it also makes that space
accessible to many different groups. On the other hand in spaces that constantly
change and evolve, it would be a mistake not to include the presence of children who
would become the adults of tomorrow.
Children face many obstacles space-wise in our country. These obstacles differ based
on the dynamics of different localities, therefore it makes it impossible to talk about a
homogenous childhood experience.
To be able to include children in the spatial design process, it is essential to
understand their relationship to the space, their needs and their obstacles.
In order to understand the expectations and desires of the children from design, it is
necessary to understand the development periods and needs of the children.Age
ranges are determinative in children's communication with the environment. The
child first communicates with the private space (house) and then with the public
space. This circle is expanding simultaneously with age ranges. The age of 6-12
years is an important period for children to connect with the city. Children start to
think both forward and backward, focus on several dimensions of a process and see
situations from someone else's eyes in this period, which also known as the concrete
operational stage. At the same time children at this ages start to go to school and
connect with public spaces and city life which means they affect the city and they are
influenced by the city. Age ranges for children refer to physical and cognitive
changes. For this reason, different methods are needed for studies for different age
groups. This thesis focuses on children aged 6-12 years.
The perception and experience of space is different for children and adults. Children
and adults use same spaces for different needs and practices. One of the major
differences is the scale. The scale difference between the adult and child impacts the
perception of borders and mobility. The borders can appear as physical things as well
as invisible – socio-psychological – borders. Moreover, those invisible borders show
a variety between the adult and child. While adults set the invisible borders on social
norms, children set it based on experience. Children use the space differently than the
adults.
Therefore it is not possible to guess how contemporary children establish their
relationships with the space, what they might need from a space, or to include
"ideas" of children based on assumptions of adults. At this point, notion of
participation comes forward.
United Nations's Convention on the Rights of the Child defines all the rights through
the principle of equality until the age of 18. The right to participate for children is
openly declared in articles number 12 and 13 of this convention.
Today, especially with the popularization of alternative education models that
contributed to the increase of child-centered spatial designs; the importance of the
relationship between space and children, and this relationship's contribution to child
development has been underlined by many disciplines. Despite this, in majority of
the human settlements it can be observed that the current spatial design criteria has
not been enough to produce spaces for children's use. Considering that today we are
in an age of fast spatial change; spatial identity, belonging and mobility becomes
obstacles to be solved for new space creations. When children are taken to account in
this framework, it is clear that children's relationship to space is fundamentally
important for social structure and – indirectly – impactful for the child development.
Especially in the urban planning and landscape architecture scales, the notion of
accessibility has to be tested by different approaches and needs to be controlled with
a variety of mechanisms.
It is not possible to talk about a one-sided relationship between children and space. It
is important to notice that just as space has an impact on the child, the child has an
impact on the space. This phenomenon appears in two occasions in particular. The
first one can be summarized as a real estate advertisement method, which underlines
that the spaces are designed for children, where the primary goal is to serve the
market economy.
When we look through the projects that center around children in the space-based
disciplines, we can see that these designs's main foci are urban landscapes. The
concept of designing pro-child usage spaces are important in projects that are trying
to find solutions to urban problems, but also this concept has an advertisement value
for projects that are designed for the market. This reality brings forth the needs of
establishing some criteria for the applications of children's participation to design
processes.
The second aspect of the previously mentioned phenomenon is realizing the agency
of children over the spatial design process, which not only improves the designs, but
also makes the participatory processes easier and has the uniting power for much
broader sections of society.
When the spatial developments of our contemporary age are analyzed, the difference
of availabilities and opportunities in rural and urban spaces become visible.
The opportunities that rural area provides for children, – such as scale, physical
borders and mobility, – helps the children of the rural areas establish stronger bonds
to their environments compared to urban children. In the rural areas children have a
usage network of the space independent of the adults. This becomes a great
advantage in the contexts of participatory design and field research.
In rural spaces, unlike urban spaces, the relationship between children and settlement
is invisible. This situation creates some questions for fast growing and developing
rural spaces.
In the literature review part of this study the previous works on the relationship
between space and children are collected and reviewed. To be able to produce spaces
centering children, it is fundamental to understand the physical and cognitive
characteristics of children and to grasp the contemporary experience of childhood
and its obstacles. The concept of childhood has changed and evolved throughout the
history, has been affected by all the new developments and changed its meaning over
time. Therefore living spaces of children and their relationships to those spaces, and
occasions where their rights are abused, need to be be contextualized with the sociopolitical
dynamics of the period.
Secondly the relationship that the child establishes with the space and the factors
defining that relationship has to be analyzed.
Thirdly the concepts of participation and participatory design are analyzed, and the
child is contextualized in the participatory design process.
After the literature review, the field study was conducted in rural spaces, particularly
in six different villages.
The main purpose of this research is to understand how children between ages of 6
and 12 perceive the space and establish their relationships with the space, to
determine the factors that establish their relationship to the space, and to experience
(and document) how children can participate in the spatial design process through
plays and games. In this study, playing – which is children's own experiential
language of perception, – is used as the participatory methodology for their inclusion
to the design process.
The most efficient way to understand children is playing. Playing is not a
methodology only used for children. Playing, – or the concept of play –, through its
universal quality has the power to include everyone. But it is important to
differentiate between the plays that are designed for adults and plays that are
targeting children from different age groups. Children do not only use playing to
reflect on their expectations from the spatial design, but also use it as a language. The
workshops are designed taking this aspect into consideration, which once again
proved the importance of observation.
To be able to provide the opportunity of inclusion for children in the design project,
every stage of the design (starting from analysis, sketching, preliminary design, and
finally to construction project) has been made into different games and plays.
The central goal of this thesis project is to experiment with the participatory process
of children through playing; and to develop these findings. Through the
documentation of the workshop process, the pre-conditions and necessities to
improve the participation of children will be presented.