Design Thinking: Innovation Process

Phase 3 | Technology — Design, Make, and Innovate. This overview carries one verified anchor. The complete four-statement set and lesson-by-lesson map live in the curriculum companion.

"Clarity of purpose and relevance derive from stakeholder values, historical influences, and cultural contexts."

📑 Full verified curriculum alignment for this unit → — Phase 3 · Years 7–8.

Throughout this 5-lesson unit, students engage in technological practice by mapping stakeholder needs, framing problems, generating ideas, and rapid prototyping. The learning intentions mapped lesson-by-lesson are:

• Lesson 1: Empathise — Study one Māori innovation case on its own terms, then use structured empathy interviews to document stakeholder needs, feelings, and surprises using empathy maps.
• Lesson 2: Define — Synthesise interview insights to frame a specific, human-centred problem statement using the Point-of-View (POV) formula and construct "How Might We...?" (HMW) design prompts.
• Lesson 3: Ideate — Generate a wide range of creative ideas through divergent brainstorming sprints, and apply convergent criteria (user need, feasibility, specifications, and resource/community impact) to select ideas for prototyping.
• Lesson 4: Prototype — Construct low-fidelity physical prototypes using paper, cardboard, and roleplay to make design thinking visible and testable.
• Lesson 5: Test + Iterate — Get direct, silent user feedback, implement one evidence-based refinement, and run a brief retest to judge whether the change helped.

Students demonstrate their progress and mastery against the following lesson-specific indicators:

• Lesson 1: Empathise
  ✓ I can complete an empathy map showing what my user said, thought, did, and felt during our interview.
  ✓ I can identify at least two unexpected needs of my user based on deep listening.
• Lesson 2: Define
  ✓ I can write a Point-of-View statement that is user-centred and actionable: [User] needs [need] because [insight].
  ✓ I can frame a "How might we...?" question that opens up multiple creative directions.
• Lesson 3: Ideate
  ✓ I can generate at least 15 different ideas during a divergent ideation session.
  ✓ I can evaluate and select the best concept based on user need, feasibility, specifications, and resource/community impact.
• Lesson 4: Prototype
  ✓ I can build a rapid, low-fidelity prototype using simple materials to test my design concept.
  ✓ I can explain which specific assumption my prototype is testing.
• Lesson 5: Test + Iterate
  ✓ I can conduct a testing session, recording user reactions without explaining or defending my design.
  ✓ I can implement one evidence-based change and record what happened in a brief retest.

Scaffold support: For entry-level learners, provide pre-structured empathy interview protocols, visual ideation boards, and pre-made low-fidelity cardboard templates. Offer guided design challenges with pre-defined problems (e.g., "redesign the school library entrance").

ELL / ESOL: Pre-teach key design terms (empathy, prototype, iteration, insight). Use highly visual maps and storyboards, and allow students to describe and sketch their ideas visually before writing descriptions in English.

Inclusion: Provide multiple pathways for prototyping (some students may excel at physical building, others at roleplaying or digital wireframing). Scaffold peer feedback to focus on constructive next steps rather than criticisms.

Mātauranga Māori boundary: Keep the Stanford-derived five-phase process and mātauranga Māori distinct. Lesson 1 studies Māori innovation as its own knowledge tradition before ākonga use a modern empathy-interview tool. Use local tikanga or kaitiakitanga guidance only when it comes from an appropriate community source; do not relabel generic design activities with Māori terms.

Prior knowledge: Best used when students have basic collaboration skills. Connects well to Social Sciences (civic action) and Arts (spatial/product design).

Learning arc: This unit uses one lesson for each phase of the five-phase Design Thinking process. The arc is not linear: Lesson 5 requires ākonga to implement a refinement and retest it, and evidence may send them back to Define or Ideate. The whakataukī "Mā te rongo, ka mōhio; mā te mōhio, ka mārama; mā te mārama, ka mātau; mā te mātau, ka ora" stands as its own teaching about listening, understanding, wisdom, and wellbeing; it is not a translation of the five phases.

Lesson 1: Empathise

• Students study a sourced Māori innovation case on its own terms, then conduct one structured peer interview about a real school challenge.
• Empathy maps capture what users say, think, do, and feel. The goal is surprise: if students come out of Empathise thinking exactly what they thought going in, they haven't listened.
• Kaiako make the knowledge boundary explicit: Māori innovation is not presented as an early form of the Stanford process, and local tikanga is not generalised into a design-thinking method.

Lesson 2: Define

• Students synthesise their empathy research into a single point-of-view statement: "[User] needs [need] because [surprising insight]."
• The "How Might We…?" question converts the point of view into a design prompt. A good HMW is specific enough to be actionable and open enough to allow multiple solutions.
• Common mistake: students skip to solutions during Define. The teacher's role is to hold the constraint — no ideas yet, just sharper problem framing.

Lesson 3: Ideate

• Divergent sprint: generate at least 15 ideas before evaluating any. "Yes, and…" over "Yes, but…" — evaluation kills generativity when it arrives too early.
• Convergent selection: students use agreed criteria (user need, feasibility, specifications, and resource/community impact) to select one idea for development.
• Where mana whenua or another appropriate local source has provided kaitiakitanga guidance, kaiako may add it as a distinct, attributed criterion rather than treating generic lifecycle scoring as “the Māori view”.

Lesson 4: Prototype

• Low-fidelity builds only — paper, card, tape, role-play scripts, storyboards. The point is to make thinking visible and testable, not to produce a finished product.
• Each prototype tests one assumption from the HMW statement. Students can and should build multiple prototypes of the same idea if different assumptions need testing.
• Māori design context: form and material carry cultural meaning — a prototype for a community solution should consider whether its materials and aesthetics are congruent with the community it serves.

Lesson 5: Test + Iterate

• Real users test the prototype while the designer observes silently and records. No explaining, no defending — the silence is the data.
• Feedback drives mandatory iteration: students implement at least one practical refinement, run a brief retest, and record what changed with direct reference to user evidence.
• The cycle may repeat: Test findings often send students back to Define or Ideate. This is success, not failure — it means the process is working.
• Culminating presentation: students present their design process (not just the final prototype) to a panel that includes a real community stakeholder where possible. The process IS the learning.

Beyond the unit: Design Thinking is a transferable process, not a unit topic. Students who internalise empathy-first thinking carry it into every subsequent project, inquiry, and leadership role. The teacher's highest-value move at the end of this unit is naming where they see the process being used elsewhere — in kura, in community, in life.