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YES, AND DRAWINGS

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YES, AND DRAWINGS

“ No” is the biggest creativity squasher out there. Which is why in the world of improv comedy, there’s no such thing as “no”. Instead, you have to build on what other actors come up with—taking something crazy (yes!) and making it even crazier (yes, and). This activity invites you to do the same through a collaborative drawing process.

 

LEARNING OBJECTIVES  COLLABORATION, IMAGINATION, VISUAL COMMUNICATION
DRAW

Everyone imagines one possible solution to the problem at hand and draws it with permanent markers on clear acetate or tracing paper.

PASS

After a few minutes of drawing time, the leader rings the bell and everyone passes their drawing to the person on their left. Take a minute to understand the drawing you’ve been passed (without asking any questions of your neighbor).

DRAW

Tape a fresh sheet of acetate over the original drawing and add to it on this new layer. Pass again and again, adding complexity with each round of drawing.

SHARE

After a few rounds, reflect on the drawings. How do they change by removing a layer or two, selectively? What happens when you add a layer from a completely separate drawing set? What new ideas pop up?

MODEL SWAP

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MODEL SWAP

It’s not easy to come up with great ideas. Sometimes it helps to collaborate with other people and trust that the results will be inspiring. This collaborative model-making game is something like the Exquisite Corpse drawing game. It helps you to quickly create several models, then evaluate and choose the best elements of each.

 

LEARNING OBJECTIVES COLLABORATION, CREATIVE PROBLEM SOLVING, SPATIAL & KINESTHETIC LEARNING
THE BRIEF

Each team gets a design brief describing the problem, site, context, and constraints. Ideally the briefs come directly from the interviews, mapping exercises, and research that this group did in the IDENTIFY and EXPLORE phases of the design thinking process. Each team is given some thought provoking questions about their design brief, and invited to discuss it for 5-10 minutes within their group.

MODEL

Everybody makes a small-scale sculpture or model of a possible solution to the design challenge they were presented. Depending on how much time you have, you can give as little as one minute or as long as 20 minutes to work on each round of the game. Every participant works on every round, and passes their model to the person on their left after each round.

ROUND ONE

Use clay or recycled materials to shape a basic structure or mass out a foundation. Don’t worry about details, we don’t need them yet!

ROUND TWO

Take the structure you are passed and make improvements to it, based on the design brief.

ROUND THREE

Take away one element of the previous person’s design. Tell them not to take it personally.

ROUND FOUR

Finishing touches—add the details that make it special.

SOLUTION SIMULATION

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SOLUTION SIMULATION

Sometimes there are issues with your solution that are only revealed once you put it into action. But by then, it may be too late to fix them! One way to anticipate potential pitfalls is to imagine that your idea has been realized, and act out what it would look and feel like, with as much detail as possible.

 

LEARNING OBJECTIVES COLLABORATION, IMAGINATION, SPATIAL LEARNING; KINESTHETIC LEARNING
GATHER

any props you may need to simulate your solution. It’s helpful to set up at the actual location where your design will be put into action, but if that’s not possible try to recreate the setting as best you can.

PREPARE

Re-create the experience of using your design solution in real life, as closely as you can. Assign roles to team members. A couple of people should be “typical” users of the product or process you’ve created, but remember that all kinds of people will encounter your design, and that the atypical ones will present the biggest challenges. Consider creating characters with physical disabilities, characters of different ages (especially very young and very old), characters that speak different languages, characters that like to cause trouble. Wigs, costumes, and props are optional, but can help people get into character.

PRETEND

Act out a few different scenarios, and pay close attention to what your actors reveal about your design. What could you change about your design to make it more useful / accessible / sustainable to those folks? Now, go refine your prototype using what you’ve learned!

BUMPING MOLECULES

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BUMPING MOLECULES

The best ideas are sometimes combinations of other,
not-as-great, ideas. Just as groups of atoms come together to form everything in this world, random collisions of unrelated ideas can spark magic.

 

LEARNING OBJECTIVES COLLABORATION, CREATIVE PROBLEM SOLVING, FLEXIBLE THINKING
SPIN

Everybody comes up with their own idea in response to a question or problem, and figures out how to say it in just a few words. The whole group is blindfolded and set loose to spin around the room like atoms.

BUMP

Every time two atoms bump into each other, they each share their idea. If they think there’s a way their two ideas could work together, they link arms and become a molecule. The pair continues spinning around the room until they bump into another atom. They share their ideas again, and if the new atom’s idea fits, they join forces to become a trio. If they can’t think of a plausible way to link their ideas, the atoms spin off in their own directions.

SHARE

When it seems like everyone likely to link up has done so, the molecules stand in clusters and present their ideas in chains— with each atom sharing their individual idea and one ‘spokes-atom’ explaining how those ideas might work together.