Free Writers' Mindsets with Design Thinking

When I was a kid there was no bigger buzzkill to my writing joy...and ego than the red pen of one Mrs. Pamela Runner at Cottonwood Elementary School in Casa Grande, Arizona. This was before the days of "writers workshop" and having kids make multiple revisions. Nope, wrong was just wrong and I took her grading pretty hard. Despite all of that I still get enjoyment from putting words together, but it would take me 35 years to really find what works for me. 

 In the early 2000s, I wrote a novel. It was a long process and nobody wanted to publish it, but I still had fun accomplishing a goal I had set somewhere in junior high or high school. You can even read Potter's Wheel for free at Amazon. Starting in 2011, I would go on to write another book, this time a biography of NFL offensive tackle Jared Veldheer. Stay in the Game was a joint venture with Jared's parents. They wanted to share their son's journey from brainy and awkward middle schooler to a 3rd round draft pick of the Oakland Raiders. They also wanted to give other parents of potential draft picks a bit of a roadmap. As an elementary teacher, I wanted it accessible to kids as well as general sports fans. Combining all of these "wants" was no easy task. 

Right about the time we were trying to get Stay in the Game going, I began learning more and more about design thinking and looking at ways to teach it in the classroom. Instead of getting really caught up in the minutia of pure design thinking, I simplified it for my students. 

• Ask: What are we trying to solve or what are we trying to create? Who are we creating this solution or thing for? What already exists that is similar? 
• Imagine: What is possible? What's our dream result?
• Plan: What's it going to take to accomplish the goal? Create a road map and a to-do list.
• Create: Jump in and get putting together your best effort. Don't be afraid to guess at ways to do things. 
• Test: How does that first attempt's "prototype" perform? Look for little things to improve.
• Fix: Re-engineer the failure-points or make changes to the solution or project that you feel makes it better. 
• Repeat: Fix and test. Test and fix until each little imperfection is polished away. 

I can't tell you when it all "clicked" for me, but when I realized that if I approached this book project through a design thinking mindset, even the simplified version from the classroom, that I could write with a lot more clarity and a lot less self-imposed anxiousness over picking the write words on the first draft. Even though the book took way too long to complete, mainly because Jared kept achieving new things in his career, it really came together. Like EnVogue taught us back in the day, "Free your mind and the rest will follow".

This new approach to writing got me thinking about how we teach writing. Admittedly as a "specials teacher" I am pretty ill-informed when it comes to the specifics of how writing is being instructed in the classrooms around me. I hear things like "Lucy Calkins", "Teachers College", and "units of study" but I am not quite sure what any of those means. What I do know is that my colleagues teach their tails off and that our kids continue to improve, writing at impressive levels. I also know that regardless of the individual techniques, just about any writing instruction can benefit from a design thinking mindset. It just relieves so much pressure and it decreases the sensitivity to feedback. Kids will relate it to other fun activities that involve design thinking. 

If you have never done any "D-thinking" with your students, it's easy. Seriously, just run a piece of fishline across your classroom and declare it a zip line and give them some parameters of what materials they can use to create a vehicle for it. We use Technic Legos but you can get inventive with any loose parts in your classroom. On a piece of paper have students write out their thoughts for the ask and imagine steps. Have them sketch a plan and then turn them loose to create. On the back of the paper have them make a log of all of the improvements. Pretty soon you will see a constant cycle of fix and test, fix and test. All you have to do next is show them that revising their writing is no different than revising whatever creation they sent down the zip line. 

I just wish Mrs. Runner had known about design thinking back in 1981...or at least had strung a zip line across her classroom. 

Help Kids Develop and Conduct Scientific Tests with an EduProtocol

Yesterday I wrote about how I have designed an "EduProtocol" to guide students through the design process. For those of you not familiar with an educational protocol, here is a quick description from Jon Corippo and Marlena Hebern's new book The EduProtocol Field Guide: 16 Student-Centered Lesson Frames for Infinite Learning Possibilities.

"EduProtocols are customizable, frames that use your content to create lessons to help students master academic content, think critically, and communicate effectively while creating and working collaboratively,"  

Kids are good at trying stuff out but not
 at developing scientific testing procedures.

A key factor in the design process is the testing of prototypes. Although I have found that my K-4 STEM students "get" the overall idea constantly designing, testing, and tweaking, they struggle with creating scientifically sound tests to know how well their prototypes work.   

Our elementary STEM program uses the Next Generation Engineering standards, specifically.

Students who demonstrate understanding can:
•3-5-ETS1-1. Define a simple design problem reflecting a need or a want that includes specified criteria for success and constraints on materials, time, or cost.
•3-5-ETS1-2. Generate and compare multiple possible solutions to a problem based on how well each is likely to meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.
•3-5-ETS1-3. Plan and carry out fair tests in which variables are controlled and failure points are considered to identify aspects of a model or prototype that can be improved.

One of my independent professional growths goals this year has been to improve students' abilities to nail that third goal. I mentioned earlier that I find kids struggle to focus on the finer points of testing beyond "just trying something out." From an instructional side, I too have struggled with how to effectively teach this. It just seemed inherent to me that kids would understand controlled conditions and how one variable effects the others....umm...no...they don't.

Protocols to the rescue. For the last month I have been working to develop a protocol which effectively helps the learner see all of the variables in play, specifically independent, dependent, and controlled variables.

I finally have a functioning protocol developed that I am finding guides kids through the steps as well as provides some onboard vocabulary support that helps them keep the terminology under control. It is also deepening their understanding of the cause and effect relationships between all of the variables. 

I have also included a second page that helps students record data, make sense of their test results, and reflect on their testing design. 

A Google Docs version is available here for you to view, download, or make a copy and tweak as you would like. Share all you would like but please don't sell it. I hope it can help your kids as much as it is helping mine. 

Design Process Student Protocol by Andy Losik is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at mrlosik.com.

Simplify Teaching the Design Process with an "EduProtocol"

We can put up posters and charts and show YouTube videos of the design process, but I have had the most success at guiding third and fourth graders through it with this original "EduProtocol".

"EduProtocols are customizable, frames that use your content to create lessons to help students master academic content, think critically, and communicate effectively while creating and working collaboratively," state Jon Corippo and Marlena Hebern in their new book The EduProtocol Field Guide: 16 Student-Centered Lesson Frames for Infinite Learning Possibilities.

Whether you are teaching kids how to form complex sentences or how to properly compare and contrast, protocols work. Having been inspired by Jon and Marlena's work, I have developed this road map for students to navigate the design process steps in terms that make sense to them and requires them to think critically along the way.

Our elementary STEM program focuses on the Next Generation Engineering standards and this protocol drives student attention to the these three standards.

Students who demonstrate understanding can:
•3-5-ETS1-1. Define a simple design problem reflecting a need or a want that includes specified criteria for success and constraints on materials, time, or cost.
•3-5-ETS1-2. Generate and compare multiple possible solutions to a problem based on how well each is likely to meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.
•3-5-ETS1-3. Plan and carry out fair tests in which variables are controlled and failure points are considered to identify aspects of a model or prototype that can be improved.

Students must start with a driving question, consider available materials as well as constraints and limitations. From there a prototype is sketched and a test is planned. Once the actual object is built it is tested and results are analyzed with students looking for points of failure. The process repeats itself as students get to work on correcting the points of failure, redesigning their prototypes and testing all over again.

So far with my third and fourth graders, I am seeing a whole new level of focus. In the past, despite all of my best efforts to make it serious and scientific,  a project like building gliders from straws and grocery bags felt more like crafting than engineering. That has definitely changed with the protocol as time must be deliberately spent on reflection and analysis. With the gliders, utilizing the elements of flight became more important than how rad your glider looked.

Additional attention beyond the protocol is given to learning about variables and testing, as well as evaluating multiple design options. Protocols are in the works for those as well as I am struggling to really develop understanding of those aspects in my students. (Update: just launched a protocol for understanding and using variables)

Here is the design protocol. The first page is the starter and then multiple copies of the second page are used for each additional generation of the design. This allows our young engineers to track their adjustments over time, but also forces them to really consider why adjustments are being made and how they will know those changes made a difference.

A Google Slides version is available here for you to view, download as PDF, or make a copy and tweak as you would like. If you share it, great! A mention is appreciated but please don't sell it.

Design Process Student Protocol by Andy Losik is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at mrlosik.com.

Fidgits: Fabulous Design-Thinking Problem-Solvers from PBS Kids

PBS has a great show called the Design Squad and with it comes a ton of fabulous challenges at PBSkids.org where users have to save little robotic creatures called Fidgits.

Teaching the design process has found a home at the core of a ton of my teaching in our elementary technology classes. "Fidgits" lets kids design their own fictional robotic creatures or perform a number of challenges to save Fidgits in danger.

How many challenges can you complete?

Although I use a pared-down version of the formal design process, I start in second grade at teaching kids that every challenge requires them to follow the design process.

1) Define the problem

2) Ideate

3) Prototype your solution.

4) Test

5) Repeat the process until it is perfect.

Fidgits is a great exercise for practicing that mindset.

Play now.