Connecting Authentic Innovation Activities to the Design Process
2018 (English)In: 2018 PATT36 International Conference, Research and Practice in Technology Education: Perspectives on Human Capacity and Development / [ed] Niall Seery, Jeffrey Buckley, Donal Canty & Joseph Phelan, Athlone, Ireland, 2018, p. 216-222Conference paper, Published paper (Refereed)
Abstract [en]
Although history is full of inventors and innovations, principles underpinning the design (or innovation) process were only first described in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Beckman and Barry (2007) connect the design process to learning by experience, a process linked to experiential learning, and a forerunner of authentic learning. This study concerns an authentic innovation project, in which 13 groups of upper secondary school students (aged 16–17 years) solved real-world problems of their choice. The five-week innovation project offered students possibilities to think, design, discuss and reflect. The specific aim of this study is to present and analyse the activities that took place at different stages of the innovation/design process by posing the following research question: Do the students taking part in the innovation project engage one or more phases of the design process? Our results suggest that students with little or no previous experience of innovating or designing, not only solve the tasks they set out to solve, but also do so in a manner that mimics the way a trained inventor might work. These observations are closely associated with the learning models described by Beckman and Barry, and have implications for the teaching of design and innovation processes.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Athlone, Ireland, 2018. p. 216-222
Keywords [en]
Authentic learning, Innovation project, Upper secondary school, Design process
National Category
Didactics
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-149069ISBN: 978-1-5272-2507-7 (print)ISBN: 978-1-5272-2508-4 (electronic)OAI: oai:DiVA.org:liu-149069DiVA, id: diva2:1223952
Conference
36th International Pupils’ Attitudes Towards Technology Conference, Athlone , Ireland, 18–21 June, 2018.
2018-06-262018-06-262018-08-24Bibliographically approved