1. 5/12/2016 Scaffolding thinking through design | NC New Schools/Breakthrough Learning
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Leslie Eaves, Instructional
Coach
SCAFFOLDING THINKING THROUGH DESIGN
BY M. LESLIE SNYDER EAVES, NC NEW SCHOOLS INSTRUCTIONAL COACH
FEBRUARY 18, 2015
Before becoming a teacher and eventually an instructional coach, I worked as an
engineer. My time in engineering left me with an appreciation for what is now
being called “design thinking.”
Design is about accepting failure as an opportunity to grow and iterating through
to a better solution. One resource de nes design thinking as “…a proven and
repeatable problem-solving protocol that any business or profession can employ
to achieve extraordinary results.” Using a design thinking approach in the
classroom helps students develop the skills to think, analyze, and solve
problems. Recently, though, I have been struck by the power that design
thinking processes hold to sca old student thinking.
Thinking Hats approach
I sat down recently with Sharrell Howard, an engineering teacher at a new innovative school in Charlotte,
to plan a lesson that would guide students through analyzing their brainstormed ideas where I would
model a student-centered instructional strategy. Students were learning how to use reverse engineering
to analyze a design and then improve it. We re ected that students do not come to us knowing how to
think the way we want them to think. We expect them to analyze, evaluate, and create; however these
thoughts are complex and are do not necessarily come naturally to them.
We decided to use the Thinking Hats, an approach to giving feedback (a critical step in any design
process). The process involves separating the types of feedback (or thinking) into di erent categories
called Thinking Hats. Each of these categories is given a color that typi es the type of thinking. We used:
• Orange – factual feedback (what are key features?)
• Red – feeling feedback (what feelings are evoked?)
• Yellow – sunny (positive) feedback (what is good?)
• Purple – critical feedback (what could be improved?)
• Green – creative feedback (what other ideas do we have?)
• Blue – summarizing feedback (which is the best design and how do we know?)
I led students through each hat while Ms. Howard collected data on how well the process supported
students’ analyzing their designs. When asked after the lesson, one student said that “We usually only look
at what is good about our designs. This helped us to look at what was bad so that we could improve.”
Another student wrote, “”The thinking hats helped me to think of the design as a whole and really, truly,
honestly come up with the best possible idea.”
Design thinking beyond the engineering classroom

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Design thinking beyond the engineering classroom
So, sure, this was an engineering classroom with students engaged in a design project. However, we can
use a similar process in any class to support students thinking more deeply about content.
Besides the Thinking Hats described above, my favorite “design thinking” strategy is using a reverse
engineering approach to engage students in critically thinking about a text or any “design” that students
may encounter in your curriculum. It starts with the assumption that every text, artifact, etc., is a design.
Similar to a mechanical device, we can take it apart and explore its components. As we explore its
components and how they t together, we better understand how they work together for an intended
outcome.
Isaac Lake, director of school services here at NC New Schools and a former English teacher, developed six
questions that lead students through this process with a piece of literature.
• What’s this thing supposed to do?
• How is it designed to do that?
• What are the component parts?
• How do they work together?
• How well do they work together?
• Is it a good design?
Engaging students to analyze a text or artifact in this way teaches students a thought process they can use
when analyzing anything from a poem to a law to a mathematical proof or scienti c process. We not only
help students learn the information locked within the “design”; we also give them a tool they can use to
unlock meaning in any scenario.
4 thoughts on “Sca olding thinking through design”
Mary Hunter says:
March 2, 2015 at 10:38 am
Is there a summer institute workshop for teachers in North Carolina that individual teachers can apply
for? If so, what is the website address. (especially in the eld of technology education, STEM or literacy
education?
Thank you,
Mary Hunter
Brown Middle School
mhunter@davidson.k12.nc.us
Leslie Eaves says:
March 5, 2015 at 11:36 am
Hey Mary,
There are several things we o er where you can get more ideas around design thinking. I think the best
one is our Scaling STEM Conference coming up April 13-15: http://scalingstem.org/. This year’s theme is
Design + Create + Inspire. I will be facilitating a session on using Design Thinking through a larger project.
We also have out Summer Institute of schools in our network each year. This will be June 23-25. We have

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We also have out Summer Institute of schools in our network each year. This will be June 23-25. We have
not nalized sessions yet, but typically we have something on this topic.
Finally, If you are interested in further exploring design thinking and PBL. We will have a Project-Based
Learning workshop July 22-24. In this workshop you will learn about the essentials of PBL and how to
design a PBL unit around a design process or incorporating aspects of design to enhance the learning
experience for students. For more information, feel free to visit our Summer Professional Learning Site:
http://ncnewschools.org/event/2015-summer-professional-learning/
–Leslie
Emerie Whitman-Allen says:
March 23, 2015 at 7:36 pm
Hi Leslie–
Nice to read your reading and hear how you’re doing! I’m thrilled to see you’re sharing the Hats with more
folks in the NC area. They are a cornerstone of my STEM Foundations classroom. I’m interested to know
about your decision to adjust the colors of the hats. In my 7th grade classroom, I have simpli ed the
meaning of the hats into more concrete terms (for example, where the work is meeting or not meeting its
goals, strategies to resolve those disconnects, etc.). I’ve used de Bono’s colors but trimmed the meaning.
Our 6th graders use prompts to utilize the hats (i.e. “I can see you’re meeting the goal of ____ because I see
____”) while the upper middle and high school students have increasing levels of exibility to internalize
the hats with their own language. We’ve found the sca olds to be really helpful as students try to
communicate big, abstract thoughts into concrete comments and discussion.
Leslie Eaves says:
March 24, 2015 at 10:35 am
Hey Emerie,
Good to hear from you. I would be interested in your trimmed meanings that you use with students and
your prompts. Please feel free to e-mail me at leaves@ncnewschools.org. Thank you so much for
introducing these to me. They have had a great impact on my work and thinking.
To answer your question about the changed colors. This came out of several discussions with colleagues
and teachers. The terms “black” and “white” have become so loaded with meaning that takes away from
the heart of the the hat and type of thinking. We also didn’t want to continue that framework that “black”
is judging or negative. Even though the type of thinking required for that hat is neutral, the words have
connotations that can create unconscious barriers to the intent of the the Thinking Hats. By switching the
colors, we seek to remove those barriers and focus on the thinking.
–Leslie
Comments are closed.

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