Lower Schools (1st-4th grade) First Experience With The Design Process

For our first, second, third and fourth grade, the third week of the year sees them being introduced to the design process (start with a Goal...then Question, Imagine, Plan, Make, Evaluate). After they understand the process, they are given a design challenge to put accomplish.

First grade, being the first time any of our students will see this process, we tell them their goal is to build a tower; we talk about what a tower is, what are some towers they have seen, and what are some towers they have built. Then they close their eyes and imagine building a tower out of Legos. They are then put in groups of 2 and asked to share their ideas with their partner. Next they decide on one idea to try and on the signal, they given 15 Legos (each group has the same types of Legos) and can build for 5minutes. At the end of the time, they stop and we look at all the towers and talk about what just happened. The students are then challenged to build a tower that is taller then the one they just built. With the same partners, same Legos, they have 5 minutes to build. When time is up, we again debrief and talk about what we just experienced.

The second graders have a similar experience, only they have to build a structure that will hold a 200g weight, 5 Legos off the table, made with only 5 pieces of paper and 2 feet of tape. The intro is the same as first grade...class discussion about questions, imagining by yourself, sharing your idea with your partner, coming up with a plan, making it and seeing if it works. This group has 15minutes to create and test. After a debrief, they try to make their structure better in some way.

We do a paper tower challenge with the third graders. 10 pieces of paper, 2 feet of tape is all they get. Their goal is to build the tallest free standing tower they can in 15minutes. The format is the same: discuss the design process, ask questions, imagine in your brain, share with your partners, make a plan, build it, test it, debrief. The difference with our third graders is that on day four, they rebuild their tower, using the knowledge they gained from the first build. This time it should be taller and more stable.

With the fourth graders, we do the paper chain challenge. The goal is to make a paper chain with the most links. They work in groups and can only use paper, tape and they have a pair of scissors. The groups have 2 minutes to "plan" how they are going to go about the challenge, then they have 3 minutes to do the creating. There are four different "makes" in this challenge. The first one has no special rules. In the second one, they cannot use their left hand (left arm, elbow are OK). For the third challenge, there is no right hand use. And the final "make" is like the first one, but there can be no talking or sound during the building time. After each build, they have to throw away any precut strips of paper and pieces of tape...each build has to start the same. At the end of all the builds, we debrief to see what they learned from the process. What you almost always see is that the final build is the best because they have learned from their failures, they work together better and they are not distracted by talking, rather they are more planned out because they can't talk.