A flexible Design Process for Invention

Makedo creates open-ended opportunities for students to work at their own level and pace to imagine ideas and create solutions. The learning is in the thinking and process of design and invention! These thinking skills and hands-on making can be encouraged in any classroom, makerspace, library program etc. When embarking on design challenges, educators can lead or support the process to encourage students’ design thinking and the invention process. We recommend using some common and simple design principles with the following stages (and remember stages may run in parallel or be repeated):

Define the Challenge
Identify and understand the challenge or idea. Who is the design for? Consider their needs and perspective?

Imagine
Research and brainstorm lots of possible solutions and ideas, ask questions, explore. Be creative.

Design
Plan what your solution will look like. Think, sketch, label it if you like. Collaborate with others (both novice and expert).

Make it!
Build a prototype or model to represent your plan.

Try it out
Enter the testing phase. What worked? What didn’t work? Ask for feedback - evaluation is crucial.

Evaluate
Reflect on how you can modify your creation to better meet your goals and improve your prototype.

Share
Share your solution with others.

Reference: the five-stage Design Thinking model proposed by the Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford (d.school) - Dam, R. and Siang, T. (2018). 5 Stages in the Design Thinking Process. Interaction Design Foundation. Retrieved from https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/5-stages-in-the-design-thinking-procss

Image credit: Classroom learning matrix via @SingleStepsBlog

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