Bill MacKenty
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The design cycle works
Considered and deliberate approach to design leads to high quality solutions. The obverse is also true.
My 9th and 10 grade (ages 15 and 16) students are working the design cycle as they solve a problem through programming. The problems are all unique, and fit the student's skill / capacity window. An example of some the projects are below:
| How to find the perfect guitar? | A web-based application to help people find a guitar based on certain criteria |
| Which sport should you play? | A web-based application help people decide what sport they might enjoy |
| Dungeons & Dragons character builder helper | A web-based application to help people build a D&D character |
The students have begun to really think and understand their problem. As they dig into the problems, I note they are changing their success criteria and more carefully adding features based on research into solutions. This process - of inquiry into a problem and understanding the problem deeply - reinforces the power of design.
In education, we talk about transfer learning, where students can transfer learning to novel scenario or situation. A key question I like to ask is:
What do I want my students to know / be able to do in 5 years, 10 years
This kind of approach to solving problems is extraordinarily powerful, and a good thing™ to have in schools. Students who do not attend to this process generally do not have high quality solutions.