Notes from the session at SXSWEDU: Remix your Learning Experience Design Process
Led by: Martin Moran & Lindsey Own
Session designed for K12 educators, provided insights that are aligned with my own work with faculty in the learning design process in higher education.
Start the conversation with educator by asking “what is the cool thing that you are doing?”
Example:
Kindergartners may remember every student creating a windsock but they may not understand the “why they did it”.
Problem:
No student choice. Ensure that you are tying the objectives and outcomes to the process.
Redesign:
Instead of everyone creating a windsock let’s let the students create a way to measure the wind. And allow them to test what they create and iterate on their designs.
Back up and ask “Why” “What do you want your learners to understand and be able to do upon completion of this activity?”
- Can visualizations be helpful?
- Comparisons?
- Can “what if’s” help in thinking about this?
- Is there a way to connect this to the community?
After reframing the lesson there can be incredible learning gains.
During the session the leaders had us think about the 10 core elements of an innovative learning experience and identify which were our greatest strengths and our weaknesses. We then relocated around the room to group into these categories and look for those who we could work with that had the strength to pull from.
Then we worked in groups to move through the design thinking process (a short version).
Design Thinking Steps: Redesign Process
Empathize: Question to understand needs of the teacher and students understand, pros and cons of existing activities.
Define: “Needs” statement, including basic learning objectives.
Ideate: Brainstorm through different types of learning pathways.
Prototype: Plan for maximizing “core elements”
Iterate: Adjust on the fly, take notes for future years.
The image above is a slide from my presentation: Using Design Thinking in the Course Redesign process that was developed for iDesignEDU while working with a partner University.