ADST: Design Thinking/Human Centred Design Thinking

Design thinking is a circular process, as shown in the visuals from Sandra Averill & Stacey Bernie's text. That not only implies that the process is meant to be repeated, but that the process is not linear, inherently opposite of a straight line. When creating anything, there may be many prototypes, drafts, and ideas that we bounce between. I appreciate this idea behind design thinking because people eventually become accustomed, students especially, to being told a "right" or "best" way to do things when there are usually many methods to go about it. This attitude may be a symptom of the desire for success ("I want to do well so I want to do it right"), which has good intentions but may result in a fear of failure or risk-taking. 

Having students go through challenges like the one in the Maine Middle School gives them a chance to see that there are many ways to go about solving problems and that it can be a good thing to take a risk even if the product does not work right away. I appreciate how much freedom each teacher gave the students for their design challenges so that they could exercise their creativity and experiment with different ways to solve the same problem. 

Peter Hill, the science teacher, mentioned "expeditionary learning" in the video, and upon further investigation, the goal of EL is to build students up in three dimensions: mastering knowledge and skills, character, and high-quality work. All of this is framed within the idea that students will one day be working in/contributing to the world so they will need the skills and attitudes to be successful in that aspect. Expeditionary Learning also aims to teach students a mix of characteristics and skills that support those three dimensions, such as empathy, collaboration, and diversity. 

Working towards something like the Maine Middle School would be a large endeavor and would require quite a bit of buy-in from other staff. I find it difficult to imagine it working perfectly in a secondary setting because students often do not take the same classes together, limiting the level of interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary work. In this case, it may be a good opportunity for the teacher-librarian to be involved as the collaborative partner for the teacher to build in ADST skills into other subject areas. This may start small with the defining and ideating stages to get students warmed up. Staff (with the teacher-librarian) could create a list of problems that are relevant to students, their community, and the world (like the renewable energy issue in the video) and start class with a discussion on what the problem is and how could they potentially be addressed. This could gradually build up towards a full design project, which I think has a lot of overlap with general inquiry projects, and have the teacher-librarian collaborate to have students work through the entire design process. The final product for these classes could be a pitch presentation or a gallery set up in the library to showcase their work. 

References

Averill, S. & Bernie, S. (21 October 2017). Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies K-9. issuu, retrieved 16 April 2021 from https://issuu.com/av3rill/docs/applied_design_skills_and_technolog

EL Education. (n.d.). Our Approach. Retrieved 16 April 2021 from https://eleducation.org/who-we-are/our-approach?utm_source=SumoMe&utm_medium=SmartBar

PBS NewsHour. (6 May 2013). Maine School Engages Kids with Problem-Solving Challenges. YouTube, Retrieved 16 April 2021 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i17F-b5GG94&t=697s [video]