This event combined some of the better elements of the small scale and large-scale prototypes I had done previously. It was aimed at my community. By targeting a community that I belonged to, I felt that I had a deeper connection to the event and I would better be able to adjust my approach if things needed to be changed. I was also better equipped to assess if the event was a success.

The premise of the event was that folks living in the community would get the opportunity to dress up baby dolls in waste materials. This event was an opportunity not only for creative expression, but critical thinking about waste and the systems we have in place that enable us to generate so much waste without a second thought.

We had 5 people come to the Garbage Patch Kids Event. Because of the size of the event, it was much easier to assess if participants were achieving the desired learning outcomes. I was able to ask specific follow up questions about a participants’ experience and clarify if they left with the desired learning. From their responses, I am confident in saying that they did learn more about the importance of waste sorting.

We had a valuable conversation about human caused climate change. A few of the participants even made backstories for their dolls centring around climate change and how it affected the babies’ lives. Aside from being amusing, it was great to see participants taking their learning to the next level. This was something I hadn’t even planned.

The most valuable moment came at the end where everyone stayed behind to clean up and they helped sort the leftover waste into the waste streams that we have in my building. We had some difficulty with sorting some of the more obscure waste items and had to use the Waste Wizard (an online search tool that can be used to figure out which items belong in which stream). None of the other participants had heard of it before and appreciated having an additional tool to figure out waste sorting.