Traditionally design and make projects have been the lifeblood of our subject - a plant moisture tester, a mechanical toy, a freestanding clock... I don't want to be too mean, so Google "D&T projects" and see for yourself....
Increasingly I have the feeling that, whilst these type of projects can have a useful skill building aspect, they do little to foster a 'designerly' disposition in students as as such there is something to be done to teach these skills.
We have decided to re-imagine our lower school (KS3) curriculum in a way that puts design skills at the front and centre and we are starting Year 7 with a terms worth of activities that aim to develop empathy, communication, ideation, prototyping and testing. We have also combined a number of smaller projects and activities into a term called Product Studies.
After some last scrabbling around for a Year 7 cover lesson last term I happened across a Technology & Engineering challenge hosted by Thinklink. We had already carried out a few product disassembly tasks with a nod to the work of The Restart Project, TeachDesign and the circular economy so this fitted in well, plus there as a prize of Amazon vouchers on offer.
After the cover lesson I was amazed to see the quality of the student submissions and the cover teacher fed-back how engaged they all were with the task. It seems that the external aspect of the task was key - students subsequently told me that they felt inspired to redouble their efforts as their work would be hosted on a 'proper' website for the world to see - they could share it with their parents.
I emailed Thinklink with a proposal for them to host a Product Deconstruction challenge and Susan Oxenvad (@soxnevad) was hugely enthusiastic and agreed to help me put something together. Feeling brave I also reached out to the photographer Todd Mclellan whose amazing photographs already adorn the walls of my department and to iFixit who create instructions on how to fix electronic items. The responses were overwhelming positive.
Todd agreed to supply images for me to use to create an example and iFixit sent me three Pro-Tech toolkits as prizes (I barely had to ask!). Susan created a shared Google Doc so we could collaboratively plan and gave up her precious holiday time for a Hangout to discuss progress.
The ThingLink Product Deconstruction Challenge is now live - sign up! I hope that it helps young designers explore the products they use everyday and that they build insight into the compromises and decisions that designers have to make and that Design teachers have a resource that that adds a different aspect to their Design teaching.
Bullet point reflections:
- Reaching out to external companies and individuals has been a very positive experience - many of the faceless companies have very helpful, lovely people in their education departments.
- It'll be interesting to see how an activity like this is regarded by students, colleagues and parents who may have quite an establish concept of what D&T is.
- The external nature of the challenge is key - creating something to be shared. This would be all but impossible without the internet.
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