If you put two teachers who have used design tasks for
a while in the same room, you can almost always engage
them in a lively debate by asking, "What makes
for a good design challenge?" Tech ed, math and
science teachers have very different answers to this
question, in part because of their different discipline
objectives and learning goals. How open-ended should
the original challenge be? Do design challenges that
converge on a single "optimal" solution violate the
spirit of exploring a meaningful design space? How many
design iterations per class period are optimal?
One of the often-touted advantages of design tasks
sounds something like, "Nature tests the design
products students come up with, not me as teacher."
Do you think design tasks should be judged by nature
or by people (or both)?
This movie is one of DITC's longest and best. You'll
hear expert educators talk about the following topics:
1. Richard Kimball
(0:03
- 0:34) |
Authentic contexts and settings
for doing design tasks are important and very different
from problems in applied science. |
2. Ed Goldman
(0:38
- 1:32) |
Ed discussed the strengths and weaknesses
of the Parachute
Task, tells of tasks he uses in his tech ed
class, and ends by describing a Transfer
Task: to make a parachute toy. |
3. Phil Sadler
(1:35
- 3:14) |
Phil outlines the typical sequence
of tasks for his CIPS
materials, while explaining its giving students
starter prototype plans and emphasis on measuring
product performance. |
4. Gary Benenson
(3:18
- 5:11) |
Gary emphasizes picking doable challenges
for students, which still have enough variables
to make design solutions varied so that they do
not converge on a single idea. |
5. Mike Hacker
(5:16
- 6:37) |
Mike describes differences between
tech ed and science teachers' use of design tasks,
and the role sketching and drawing plays with these
educators. |
6. Woodie Flowers
(6:42
- 8:09) |
Woodie outlines the progression
of a good design program: from easy-to-hard challenges
(hard = large group; open-ended task; limited time;
limited budget). |
7. Richard Kimbell
(8:13
- 11:03) |
Richard tells a story of a student
trying to stop the stealing of lobsters from pots,
and holds it as an authentic problem the child chose
to solve while learning science in-depth. |
