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Design Thinking: The Wallet Project

This year I am extremely fortunate to teach an elective class called Design Thinking. Last year, through the support of my principal and district, I was able to attend many professional development sessions focused on Design Thinking. In this elective, modeled after Stanford's Institute of Design, teams of students are introduced to the creative process of designing meaningful solutions to problems at a local, domestic, and global level.  Students are encouraged to think and go “big,” while focusing on the key stages of the design cycle: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test. Students are guided to identify needs, design solutions, collaborate with peers, and present their findings to a meaningful audience. As my colleague and I designed our Design Thinking curriculum over the summer, I would often second-guess my decisions: Will the students enjoy the class?  Will they understand the importance of the Design Cycle?  Will they be engaged?  Will this elective be meaningful?

Over the past four weeks, I have been able to answer yes to each and every one of these questions.  What I experience on a day-to-day basis in my Design Thinking elective blows me away.  I have never seen so much active and engage learning within one class period. My students have taught me to trust my instincts as I continue to create design challenges for them.  I know that at the end of this semester elective I will be able to look back on all we accomplished together, and the positive impact the students will have left on their community.  

One of the first major design challenges we attempted in class is called “The Wallet Project” (adapted from Stanford University’s Design School).  The gist of this project is for students to design something their partner (their user) needs: in order to do this the student needs to first empathize with the user and follow the Design Cycle.  Last week, my students presented their final prototypes to the class and I was impressed by their creativity and hard work.  I can’t help but share some of my favorites!

The Wallet Project Final Prototypes:
1) A Personal Video Game Chair: through the empathy stage, the designer realized the user spends all of his free time playing video games.  The user wanted to be able to continue to play video games even when he got hungry or someone texted him, etc. The student designer ended with a video game chair that included a refrigerator, microwave, communication tool, and more!  

2) Car/Food Service: As middle school kids, my students are unable to drive themselves.  That is why one student designed a car that could help her user get from one place to another without needing a driver.  The car also had the awesome feature of providing any type of food to the occupant(s).  I want this car!

3) Baseball Hat with Secret Compartments:  One of the users explained to the designer that he loves to wear hats, and would like a way to safely carry his things in his hat.  The designer was able to create a hat that included zipper and snap pockets on the inside of the hat.  Think about the possibilities of keeping money and credit cards safe from pickpockets without having to wear a fanny pack (no offense to diehard fanny pack users).  


Car/Food Service


Hat with Secret Compartments


Hat with Secret Compartments


Personal Video Game Chair


I was allowed to try on the "Hat with Secret Compartments"

I am looking forward to seeing what my students come up with next time. Currently, we are working on designing a space in our school library to showcase the students’ prototypes.  One focus of the design is to make this showcase of prototypes interactive for the other students that visit! I will update you on the end result; I know that they are going to exceed all expectations with this one!


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