Design thinking is a learning approach that focuses on developing students' creative confidence. Design includes many elements such as thinking, developing empathy, promoting action-oriented prejudices, directing thinking, developing meta-cognitive awareness, being active, problem-solving, and using one's imagination. Through
design-oriented thinking, the pedagogical repertoire of teachers is expanded (AEÜSBED, 2019). The design-oriented thinking process begins with the definition of a problem. It involves research and the ranking of priorities that often compete. It tests the applicability of multiple solutions with prototypes and ends with the social evaluation of objects. (Davis, 1998). Considering that the most important factor in individuals' lives is creative problem solving, design thinking is a highly functional approach to finding creative solutions to complex problems.
Design thinking supports students' critical thinking, social development, teamwork skills, and academic performance. It increases students 'academic performance by contributing to students' understanding, identification and analysis process.
Many studies found that low academic levels and low grades are strong predictors of school drop-out. According to the data obtained from European Commission, over 46% of youths are at risk of social exclusion since the education system has not been successful in preparing and maintaining teachers and trainers with high performance to provide their learners with practical and authentic skills. Correspondingly, the learners lack guidance, applicable and life context skills, which are creative thinking, problem-solving and collaboration skills, so they are left with a few options like early school drop-out. Low academic success is one of the variables that can be the predictor of school drop-out alone. Low academic success leading to school drop-out damages the individual's self-esteem and creates a sense of loss of control.
In line with all these requirements and the data (COE), there is clearly a gap in teachers' academic success to prevent early school leaving by providing their learners with applicable skills and guidance. This project will bridge this gap through the training modules based on design thinking skills.
The project aims at increasing academic success of teachers, supporting the professional development of educators, empowering teachers/trainers/educators with resources to teach design thinking skills, equipping teachers with a design thinking mindset, facilitating the adoption of design thinking educational practices, strengthening the capacity of educational authorities, policymakers and decision-makers to promote and mainstream design-thinking educational practices, as well as decreasing early school drop-out through the following intellectual outputs:
- Methodological Framework for Design Thinking Skills in Secondary Schools
- Training Content for Teachers and Online Learning Platform
- Instructional Guide and Practical Resources to Promote Design Thinking Skills
- Recommendation Paper to promote Design Thinking Skills in Education
The target groups are teachers, trainers, educators, decision-makers, policymakers, and educational authorities.
This project will directly impact academic success with the design thinking approach in multi-disciplinary areas in education and enhance the instructional capacity of teaching staff.
The envisaged impact will be increased social inclusion of European students through mainstream design thinking education at schools.
For more information, please, visit the project website
https://dts4teachers.eu/
ITA