Week Three

Design Briefs are aimed at developing children's higher order thinking skills while encouraging independence. The design brief provides support, ensuring the students have a higher rate of success while working independently. The children are given a challenge and the materials that can be used to solve the problem. It also provides an opportunity for children to work through every stage of a project: writing up the drafts, then making the final product. Not only will this help with their planning skills, it will also aid their analytical skills. If their final product doesn't turn out the was they had hoped, they can go back through the design brief to find where it went wrong.  

Out task: make the 'frog' jump using a piece of cardboard, some sticky tape, an elastic band, and a picture of a frog. All we did was fold the cardboard in half, tie the elastic band around it, then stuck the frog on the front. We didn't really talk about it before one of the group members (me) just grabbed the stuff and started playing with it. It was interesting listening to the members of my group talk about what they thought the challenge was: They thought it was about making the picture of the frog jump, whereas I thought it was meant to be all the one thing.

Practical application:While the use of a design brief is a good idea, it would be completely useless (especially for those 'hands on type kids') if they were given the material along with the brief because the kids will just start playing with it. We barely used ours. Start with the design brief, wait ten minutes, then give them the material.

Weekly Reading:

Materials technology (ID/P/E –VELS)

http://vels.vcaa.vic.edu.au/dct/downloads.html

It's interesting to note the shift of focus through the last forty years within the educational system on what is deemed as important. When my parents went to school there were technology schools as an alternative to academically based secondary schools. These schools, for whatever reason, were closed down and all teenagers were forced into secondary schools. Throughout my secondary school career the technology aspect of education was never completely forgotten, wood/metalwork, ICT, home eco was still incorporated into the curriculum. Today we a shift from the importance placed on academia back to recognising the importance of technical skills. VELS places a heavy emphasis on creativity and technology.