Abstract
Synonymous with imagination and reasoning, creative and critical thinking used together increases the possibility of desirable outcomes in situations requiring problem-solving which is a prime function of design. Teaching creativity and criticality appears to be an inevitable task in design education. However, it is often assumed that learners will gain these thinking skills tacitly as a by-product of certain course content delivery that focuses on conceptual or factual knowledge and technical skill development, for the creative disciplines. This paper examines the effectiveness of “Think Lab”, a domain-specific, experimental learning module, that aims to develop the creative and critical thinking potential of foundation (first) year undergraduate students of design. Drawing from the work of creativity experts Edward De Bono and Michael Michalko, amongst a few others, Think Lab equips students with formal tools, techniques and strategies for creative and critical thinking. It takes a constructivist approach to learning-teaching, strategically combining the tenets of experiential learning theory and collaborative learning. Primary data has been collected from three batches of students who attended Think Lab, to investigate the appropriateness of the content (what is taught) as well as the effectiveness of the learning-teaching methodology (how it is taught), in context of their future design learning and practice.
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Mittal, P. (2021). THINK Lab: An Initiative to Foster Creative and Critical Thinking Amongst First Year Design Students. In: Chakrabarti, A., Poovaiah, R., Bokil, P., Kant, V. (eds) Design for Tomorrow—Volume 2. Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies, vol 222. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-0119-4_25
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-0119-4_25
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