Design Thinking in the Classroom

Reading about the LAUNCH design, I've struggled to figure out how to incorporate it into my classroom next year.  Student empowerment, student choice, creativity ... all of those I can envision.  Design thinking?  That's tougher.  I'm intrigued, however, and I wanted to go deeper, so I did purchase the LAUNCH book - and I'm working my way through it.  I'm about halfway through and, while I still don't fully see how I can use this in my ELA classroom, they do discuss Wonder Days, 20% and other methods of allowing students to follow their passions, which I can see using a bit more easily than the full LAUNCH design.  Maybe I'm reading it wrong and it's not as "big" or as time-consuming as it seems, but since the authors even note that time is a valid issue, I may not be as far off as I think I am.

That being said, I did connect to what the authors said about research.  Too many times we think only of text-based research, when there are so many other sources out there students can use.  With my media background, I'm all over that :)  Yes, there's text research, but there's also multimedia (YouTube was the example they gave - if you want to learn how to do something, most people will watch YouTube videos over reading a manual).  Videos, podcasts, etc. are just as valid as some text-based sources.  As the authors point out, no matter what type of source your students use, they have to learn how to evaluate it (if it's reliable, for example). 

One quote that stuck with me, so far, is "If you assign a project and get back thirty of the exact same thing, that's no a project.  That's a recipe."  To me, this fits into everything we've talked about so far in this class - student ownership, student choice, and creativity.  If we set what standards we want to hit, but we give the kids leeway on the product (and possibly the journey), we're getting them to think deeper.

I'm going to finish the LAUNCH book (not before this class is over, but hopefully before the year is over!)  I'm also going to continue digging into project-based learning and other collaboration designs.  It's possible I'll never use LAUNCH in its entirety, but in combination with things - or simply adopting the mindset of the authors - I think I can bring a lot of interesting methods to my classroom next year.