Empowering Children Through Creative Problem Solving Projects

Studies and research have shown how attitudes and beliefs play such an important role in the solution-oriented ecosystem needed in the 21st Century. We cannot overlook the power that Creative problem-solving projects hold in building skills and muscle for thought and conceptualization. Multiple layers of easy learning for kids can be seamlessly built within a typical problem-solving project, which can stretch beyond just the curricular ones and can extend to developing and testing attitudes and beliefs of the learners about self and the peers. 

To keep pace with the demands of the 21st Century, we cannot overlook the importance of building not just competencies but also character traits, allowing them elasticity to handle the rapidly changing world. In a nutshell, Creative Problem solving requires a complex blend of skills in students which continuously gets tested and honed throughout every procedural stage. According to me, there could be seven primary layers that teachers could focus earnestly, during the project creation process for their specific learners:

1. What are the skills that one wants to develop in the learner?
2. To what extent is prior knowledge getting utilized in Foundational Literacy, during the execution process?
3. What are the competencies getting built through the project?
4. What kind of character traits will this project build in the learners?
5. Does the project have enough bandwidth to allow children to tinker and innovate?
6. Does the project involve researching and sorting data and/ or information?
7. To what extent will the learner be able to handle and manage uncertain situations with ease after completion of the project?

 Once the teacher has made a dry run over these points in the mind, the project creation stage becomes a powerful one. 

Another interesting point to note is that: It is at this project creation stage that the competencies and self-beliefs of a teacher also get tested. A teacher, who is a comfortable risk-taker would automatically encourage risk-taking among students and develop projects that would involve deep explorations and manipulation of objects and materials around. A teacher who loves control and is averse to uncertainty will not want situations going out of hand. He or she would automatically design projects that would have reduced flexibility and explorations so that at no point the control slips off hand.

Some of the things that I urge every teacher to consciously take into account while designing projects for Creative problem-solving skills are:

1. When projects are created keeping innovation in mind, children develop a strong muscle for failure and not get overwhelmed every time they make mistakes. Projects that involve construction and prototyping always put students in situations where they experience failing multiple times until a creative and viable solution gets established.
2. Since Creative Problem solving revolves around creativity at its core, children learn a very important skill that there is nothing right or wrong, but a viable solution in every situation. Thus negotiation skill gets subtly but strongly built into the CPS project. This can be a very powerful muscle to build in our learners today, since the matrix of the modern world has far shifted from a clear-cut, black and white one, and has huge components of grey. CPS projects, when given at the school level can actually help children understand the greyness and thrive in it.
3. Another valuable attitude that needs focus is the spirit of high entitlement that one sees deeply entrenched in today’s children. Many times we find children unable to accept contradictory opinions and points of view of others. This is on the rise also due to the high-headedness and deep-seated entitlement that this generation of children is growing up with. As families are shrinking with one or two children for every parent, entitlement can be a hugely detrimental quality that is engulfing our modern children. It can be a huge stumbling block, especially when they are expected to thrive in the rich collaborative ecosystem of the 21st Century. A smart teacher could design projects involving multiple feedbacks taken at various crucial points in the project execution stage. This methodology could be a powerful way of formally breaking the entitlement bubble that children of today live in.
4. Projects built with a maker-centered approach can help build risk-taking in children; as they experiment, explore and manipulate materials while making stuff. When children construct a variety of solutions, (after exploring various options), they are also learning slate and take responsibility for their choices. A strong agency thus gets developed in them, and they start looking at themselves as change-makers.

When children gather experiences like these and much more, they develop a muscle to handle failure and adversity during the process. This helps them grow up feeling empowered. They develop a sense of authority to effectively navigate through future challenges in life. Creative Problem Solving projects can actually be a powerful game-changer when it comes to teaching children multiple skills that involve not just literacy, but also competencies and character traits.

When children grow up with a strong sense of self-worth and confidence to create solutions and rise above failure in life, they also feel prepared to manage change and uncertainties in a more empowered manner.

One Teacher One Scientist is the pioneer in STEM education, STEAM learning an experiential form of the learning program in India, promotes holistic education to develop 21st-century skills among children.

Original Source: Empowering Children Through Creative Problem Solving Projects