Classroom Bigfoot: What kids can teach us about innovation

“This would never work.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“Let me think on that.”

When you or your team is trying to come up with new ideas, how often do these words come into your head or out of your mouth? I’m certainly guilty of them more than I’d like to admit. There is a time and place for judgment, but it’s thinking like this that kills interesting ideas.

How can we think about our problems in new ways? Most individuals have a good deal of trouble addressing this question about their own profession. It may be tricky, but it’s the first step to build creative, innovative solutions that more effectively address or illuminate real problems. Many businesses pay consultants large amounts of money to take a stab at it.

Thinking about our problems in new ways is tough because we have to imagine other possibilities for the world beyond the one we work so hard in every day. In fact, one of the main obstacles standing in the way of innovative ideas may be that adults tend to think too much like adults.

“Design a solution to a problem at school.”

That was the only guideline we gave our group of middle school students during a week long digital design camp in a summer arts program. We didn’t tell them what problem to solve or what type of solution to design. What we did instead was guide them through a creative problem solving process called Design Thinking in which the class itself directed the topic and the kids made their own decisions every step of the way.

The results were mesmerizing. The kids deftly handled a very open-ended design process to develop solutions that changed our thinking about school. Their concepts were disruptive and seemingly out of left field. Exactly the type of concepts that push thinking in new directions and drive innovation. Exactly the type of concepts that adult leaders struggle to come up with.

Through a week of hands-on Design Thinking activities, students interviewed each other about problems at school; brainstormed over a hundred possible solutions; developed their concepts through hand sketches, paper prototypes, and digital renderings; and created an exhibition that showcased their product designs to the rest of the summer program and their parents.

Kids approached the Design Thinking process differently than most adults do in a few keys ways. What they lacked in experience they made up for in fearlessness, adaptability, and honesty. Let’s take a closer look at how they did it.

Fearlessness

Kids are less self conscious about whether an idea will work

As a class, the students brainstormed different problems they see at school and then formed teams to pick their favorites. For example, one team picked the problem “Being distracted by other students in class.”

There were a bunch of fantastic, creative ideas to address this problem, including large glass domes that lower from the ceiling over each desk, and a colorful remote control for the teacher that could silence noisy kids with the click of a button. One student in particular, named Luke (not his real name), blew us away by developing a concept he called “Classroom Bigfoot.”

Though the problem that came up in discussion was about being distracted by other students in class, Luke insisted that if teachers were more interesting then students wouldn’t get distracted. And so, if a teacher were wearing a Bigfoot costume during class, students would pay attention and not distract each other.

Outlandish? Yes. Funny? Absolutely. But useful? Actually yes, and here’s why…

Luke saw the problem differently than it was presented. He wasn’t worried about spending his time in design camp developing an idea that would be very difficult to implement in a real classroom (not because it is difficult to build, but because it conflicts with basic assumptions of teacher authority). By developing an idea that goes against the grain of what should be possible or allowed in a classroom, Luke pointed out a glaring problem in school today: teachers are often not seen as interesting or engaging to their students. Luke’s fearlessness and lack of self-consciousness shows a clear opportunity for innovation.

Adaptability

Kids are more adaptable to different ways of thinking

Another team in the class chose the problem “Losing track of small items.” They found they were often losing or misplacing things at school, from pencils to electronic gadgets.

One student, named Kyle (also not his real name), was excited about an idea that came up in brainstorming about a “Hot or Cold” wristband that could help you find a lost item. When close to the item the wristband turns red or “hot” and when you move far away it turns blue or “cold.” I checked in with him later on in class and he looked frustrated. He told me the wristband idea seemed too hard to create and he felt stuck.

I pointed out that there are plenty of products on the market that have figured out how to pair with devices through bluetooth or wifi, and his idea was a wonderfully simple and fun way to utilize that technology. All I needed to do was encourage him and give him some activities to move his idea forward. We showed him and the rest of the class how to take their ideas and bring them to life through digital mock-ups, physical prototypes, and 3D digital renderings.

What I learned from Kyle is that kids get frustrated (and can start thinking like adults) but they get unstuck really quickly when shown new ways of thinking. He didn’t stubbornly stick to his original assessment that his design would be too difficult to make, but used the structure we gave him to develop his idea into a disarmingly simple and delightful product concept.

Honesty

Kids don’t overthink their ideas

Where almost every student shone much brighter than adults was during the ideation phase of our process. They had no trouble coming up with dozens of ideas per team, resulting in over a hundred idea sketches in our class of twelve.

Check out some of the idea sketches from the team that chose the problem of “not having enough time to get things from their lockers between classes” (in the photo above):

• Jetpack to locker
• Tunnel between classroom and locker
• Book Buddy robot
• Anti-gravity backpack
• Bribery of teachers / hall monitors
• Teleportation device

These ideas push and pull at the original premise of the problem. They offer new technology, new ways of thinking about how schools are built, and even school rules that we so often take for granted. Without over thinking their ideas they easily jumped to the heart of the problem with honesty and enthusiasm.

Go ahead, think like a kid

Like many people (and especially as a designer) I’m often in situations where there’s a lot of pressure to come up with new ideas. When this happens I try to take hints from these kids.

They have taught me the importance of exploring wild ideas and taking them seriously. It is much easier to make a wild idea practical than it is to make a safe idea unique. Wild ideas challenge what we know about our problems and shine a light on our assumptions. They are exactly what we need to see our problems differently and address them in innovative ways.

Now, when I need new ideas I start by not worrying if they will actually work, I purposely stay open to different suggestions and ways of thinking, and I’m careful not to overthink the ideas my team comes up with.

Will we see bigfoot costumes in classrooms across the country anytime soon? Probably not, but the idea clearly shows us the problem of teachers trying to stay engaging when teaching a lesson to a room full of students. There are already forward-thinking schools and programs like High Tech High, Studio H, and Trep Studio challenging the idea that teachers must deliver lessons every day and remain the center of attention in the classroom.

So the next time you or your team is stuck coming up with new ideas try asking yourself a simple question, “What’s the ‘Classroom Bigfoot’ for this problem?”