Hello there, my name is Mrs. Dhami.

Welcome to your design and technology lesson today.

Now, the big question for today is how can we produce a huge range of design ideas where we do not get fixated and tunnel visioned on one? So we are going to explore lots of different strategies today, hopefully some that you will use as part of your iterative design journey.

So hard hats on, let's get cracking.

Our outcome for today is we will be able to use a range of strategies to create design ideas which avoid design fixation.

Our keywords for today are design strategy, design fixation, iterative, design requirements and design decisions.

Now, I'll explain each of these as we come across them, but there's two that I want to go through before we move on.

So design fixation is when we consider only one possible solution, we don't think of other design ideas, because we get tunnel vision.

Iterative, let's quickly remind ourselves we are in the iterative journey, and that's a journey where we constantly refine and improve our ideas so that we create the best possible design solution.

We have two learning cycles for our lesson today.

First of all, we have design decisions and second of all, design strategies.

So let's get started with design decisions.

The big picture for our iterative journey today is we are going to explore and select a range of design strategies, so to avoid design fixation.

We're going to explore how to communicate feedback and design decisions too.

Now, let's put a little bit of context to this and a bit of explanation.

Design strategies are methods of generating design ideas.

But before we get to that in our second learning cycle, it's important to consider how to make successful design decisions based on your design requirements so that they are not missed when you actually get down to generating design ideas.

And that's why we're going to start off today's lesson talking about design decisions.

A design decision is a deliberate choice to meet a design requirement or solve a problem.

Design requirements, if you remember, were collated into your specification.

A design requirement is something which is needed or wanted to make a product successful.

Referring to or measuring against your design requirements ensures the correct design decisions are made.

Effective design decisions ensure your product or solution is successful.

What could a successful design decision look like? Jacob has a go.

He says, "I am going to make it fold up." Then Sofia has a go.

She says, "Product A is too bulky and will be difficult to transport.

My design requirement states that it should be easy to carry around.

So if I make it fold up into the base, it will be compact." Why is Sofia's design decision more successful? It obviously is, but what is it about it that is more successful? Pause the video, have a think.

Come back to me when you've got an idea.

Well done if you managed to notice that it refers to the design requirement, it provides justification, and lastly, it provides direction for the iterative journey.

There are lots of different ways to communicate design decisions.

You don't just have to annotate.

So let's explore a few.

You could annotate, as we've already said.

You could produce some developed sketches to show how you're gonna take it forward.

You could do added prototypes to show those design decisions.

You could provide some analysis or measuring against your design requirements.

You could provide feedback from your primary user and stakeholders, because remember, at the end of the day, they are the people who are going to be using your product or have an interest in your product.

You may have your own ideas that work for your iterative journey.

You're not just limited to these.

But we're gonna explore a few of these in a tiny bit more detail.

Have a look closely at the methods of communication that Jun has chosen to show his design decisions.

Pause the video, have a little look.

Come back to me when you've got an idea.

Well done for having a look.

So Jun chose to annotate some of his prototypes, so pictures of his prototypes, with comments referring to his design requirements.

He used his findings to make successful design decisions and recorded these through annotations and sketches as part of his iterative journey.

And hopefully you noticed both of those.

A lovely piece of work, Jun.

Aisha says, "Annotations can only describe the design idea or development." Is her statement true or false? Have a think, pause the video.

Come back to me when you've got an answer.

Well done if you got false.

And why is that? Successful annotations not only aid the understanding of the design, but also reference and measure against design requirements, including insights from primary users and stakeholders.

Effective design decisions can then be made.

Keep bringing it back to those really important design requirements.

Izzy chose a different communication method for her design decisions.

So Izzy chose to analyse some of her design ideas against her design requirements in her specification.

She used her findings to make successful design decisions and recorded this as part of her iterative journey.

Well done, Izzy.

Lucas chose a different way to communicate his design decisions.

Pause the video and take a little look at what you think he did.

Come back to me when you've got an idea.

Well done if you identified that Lucas chose to ask his stakeholders what they thought of his design ideas.

They voted with counters.

You see the little circles on his work? And provided written feedback.

And you can see that in the little yellow strips of paper.

He used these to make successful design decisions and recorded this as part of his iterative journey.

Lovely idea, Lucas.

You might have some of your own ideas too.

Laura chose to record her primary user feedback using audio and visual feedback.

So she sent some pictures of her ideas and got some text message replies, and she also did some video calls where she showed her ideas via video.

So Laura, how did you present this in your NEA? Laura says, "I took screenshots of texts, text messages, and embedded videos into my NEA." If you're thinking of doing this, it might be a good idea just to have a little chat to your teacher about how you can show this in your NEA.

Laura then used these to make successful design decisions and recorded this as part of her iterative journey.

Lovely idea, Laura.

Time for a quick check-in.

Successful design decisions, A, refer to or measure against the design requirements, B, can only be communicated through annotation, C, provide direction for the iterative journey, and D, provide justification.

Have a think, come back to me when you've got an answer.

Well done if you identified A, C, and D.

Successful design decisions refer to, measure against the design requirements, provide direction for the iterative journey, and provide justification.

Onto task A.

Number one, I'd like you to define design requirements.

Number two, define design decisions.

Number three, list three ways a design decision could be successful.

And lastly, list three ways that you can record design decisions.

Good luck.

Come back to me when you have got some great answers.

Part one, your answers could include design requirements are something which is needed or wanted to make a product successful.

Part two, a design decision is a deliberate choice to meet a design requirement or solve a problem.

Making these design decisions means that hopefully you produce a successful design solution.

Part three, answers could include successful design decisions refer to or measure against design requirements, provide justification, and most importantly, provide the direction for your iterative journey, so you keep moving in the right direction to a successful design solution.

Part four, ideas for communicating design decisions.

So just like the examples that I've just gone through have shown, annotations, developed sketches, prototypes, analysis or measuring against design requirements, and feedback from primary user and stakeholders.

Feel free to go back to any of the slides that we have covered if you need any help with communicating your design decisions.

Onto learning cycle two, design strategies.

Design strategies are methods of generating design ideas.

It is easy to become fixated on one design.

So using various strategies avoids design fixation, encourages design decisions, and opens up exciting possibilities for successful solutions.

You might produce an idea which you had not thought of before, and that's rather exciting.

We are going to explore a few design strategies for generating design ideas.

You are not limited to the design strategies we share.

You might have done more throughout your design and technology education or different ones, and that's absolutely fine.

Some will be right for your design brief and others will not.

This is your chance to choose and this is your iterative journey.

When you are creating these amazing designs, you may identify a design decision at any point.

Please, please remember to record it, otherwise you will forget it.

Remember, design decisions help you to make important choices for how to make your solution as successful as possible.

So you could highlight it, you could circle it, you could write it in another colour.

It's entirely up to you.

Some of the design strategies that I'm going to share with you will produce design ideas that are not created actually by yourself.

So it is important to explain the design strategy and why you chose to use it for your iterative journey.

And then obviously to attribute the person or the programme or app who have created the design for you.

Then, of course, the design decisions will be your own.

So justify your own design decisions.

The design ideas that need attribution have been highlighted for you so that you don't forget.

A lovely strategy to use is to get your primary user or some of your stakeholders designing for you.

Yes, you heard that right, designing for you.

You could ask them to produce a design idea or even a prototype for you, because they might think of a solution you had not considered.

And you can see here, Lucas has asked his primary user and also one of his stakeholders to both produce an idea for him.

However, all the design decisions, all the conclusions are his own work.

You've done a great job there, Lucas.

Remember though, of course, if you didn't create it, if your primary user or stakeholder did, they will need attributing.

And of course, record any design decisions that you make.

Similarly to the last idea, but slightly different is collaborative designing.

That's when you get your stakeholders or your peers or your family to produce design ideas or prototypes for or with you.

So here's Lucas's idea.

You can see he's got nine different ideas for his design brief here.

Now what Lucas did was he shared his design brief with the whole of his class.

And then on little bits of paper, all the students wrote, sorry, drew out, and then annotated a design idea for Lucas.

It produced him nine completely different ideas that perhaps he hadn't considered before.

So the more you have, the more you get to choose from.

Just remember, you will need to attribute the stakeholders who have produced the design ideas for you.

And don't forget, record any design decisions that you make from these design ideas.

Alex says, "I already know what I want to design and what it should look like.

I do not need to bother with any more design ideas." Is this statement true or is it false? Have a little think.

Come back to me when you've got an answer.

Well done if you got false.

Of course it's false.

Using a range of design strategies ensures that you avoid design fixation and you could possibly discover a design which you had not yet thought of or perhaps a part of a design that you had not yet thought of.

It's great to use these design strategies to produce more than your brain can do.

Artificial intelligence, often abbreviated to AI, is a great strategy for producing you some design ideas without fixation.

So one of the techniques is word to image where you can experiment with the words that you put into it to see what design ideas are generated.

And you might be surprised at some of the things that are designed for you.

You can then obviously edit them.

You can change your words and see the differences.

It's great, have a go.

You can also though use AI to do sketch to image, where you could produce some initial sketches or just like I've done, I've done some plasticine prototypes here.

I've taken a picture, drawn on top, and then I've put a picture of that into AI.

You could do either.

You can then ask AI to develop it or to render these sketches.

Again, it's a great starting point for producing some unusual ideas and adapting some of your ideas.

Of course, though, the AI application will need attributing, because you did not produce, you might have given it some hints, but you didn't produce the final image.

Please don't forget the attribution.

And of course, record any design decisions that you make as you see these wonderful designs being produced.

Morphology is a way of generating design ideas by combining different aspects and those aspects is entirely what you decide them to be.

So for example, it could be function, material, colour and style.

Let's take a little look at the images on the right.

These are all plant pot holders.

So the first one uses grey, timber, and minimalist.

Morphing those ideas together creates those.

Next one, green stripes, textile and natural.

Morph those words together and you get a completely different outcome than the first one.

And lastly, grey, paper, and board and funky.

And again, a completely different design idea.

All three are completely different.

Now you could do this by hand, you could do this by drawing.

You could do this by CAD or you could use AI as we have just discussed.

But if you do use AI, remember you need to attribute, As you go through using morphology, record any design decisions that you might make.

Biomimicry is when we take inspiration from nature for form or function or even both.

Take a little look at the picture in the middle of the hook and loop.

Now you'll recognise this on cloves.

You'll probably recognise it on some bags and many other products.

Now, hook and loop was inspired by the burrs of the burdock plant, because those little spikes, those little burrs cling to cloves and fur due to their tiny little hooks.

And this gave the inspiration for the design of hook and loop.

You may have heard of fastskin fabric.

Now, fastskin fabric is used in competitive swimwear.

It mimics the skin of a shark, giving a streamlining effect underwater and reducing drag, which is another word for resistance.

How cool is that? So have a think.

How could nature inspire your design ideas? Perhaps it might be that you need to do a little bit of extra research to help inspire you along this route, but there's some great ideas out there if you look carefully and closely.

And don't forget, record any design decisions that you make.

Bisociation is the technique of connecting two unrelated concepts to produce an even better new idea.

So let's take the cyclone vacuum cleaner as our example.

That combined the centrifugal force of an extractor with the current at the time bagged vacuum cleaner to make the bagless cyclone vacuum cleaner, which we often take for granted now, but was an absolutely new invention at the time.

Now, yours doesn't have to be quite as complicated as that.

It could be simply looking around your school, looking around your home and seeing what you could find that you could connect with your design idea.

So I'm looking across there and I can see a big magnet.

Well, actually I could use a magnet perhaps as an opening and closing mechanism to keep something closed.

Perhaps I could combine that into the design brief that I am thinking of.

Have a go, folks.

Look 'round, see what you can find.

See what you could connect, and you might surprise yourself.

Remember though, record any design decisions that you make as you go through these strategies.

Reverse engineering is the process of taking something apart to understand the components inside.

'Cause then once you've taken them apart, you could identify what could be eliminated or reduced and what could be added.

And this sometimes helps us to rethink how products are made and ultimately how they look and function too.

And you can see a lovely disassembly of a hot glue gun and a watch, and you can see all the parts that make up those two products.

Now please note what Laura is saying.

Remember to check with an adult before you take something apart in case it's dangerous or in case you're not actually allowed to take it apart.

And don't lose any of the parts if you do take it apart.

And as we've said before, you've got it now, record any design decisions that you might make along the way.

There are so many amazing designs already out there from past and present designers and areas of art history.

It's worth a good internet search.

It's worth a look around some shops or some museums to identify some of these products that might inspire you to create some really different ideas to move away from design fixation.

So for example, the Alessi toilet brush.

If you've never seen this before, I'm sure if I only showed you that picture on the left, you probably wouldn't work out that it is a toilet brush and toilet brush holder.

But it is, and it's done in a fun, unique way.

Perhaps your design brief needs a bit of fun put into it.

There's different periods of art history too, which really do have different inspirations such as Art Deco.

The geometric shapes used in Art Deco are absolutely beautiful.

And perhaps the form of some of the things from Art Deco might inspire you or perhaps a completely different part of our history.

Now, not just looking at form, but a lot to do with function too.

Hippo roller is a product that designed for people in developing countries to be able to transport water from wells or taps to areas which do not have running water.

A fantastic design.

However, you could take inspiration from products like this, and that is exactly what happened with the aqua roll.

Now the aqua roll is a camping product that is used in many, many, many countries to transport water from taps to your little camping area that you are at.

And that is influenced by the hippo roller.

So it's a great idea for identifying successful features or perhaps those to be improved.

But it's also a great idea for providing you inspiration and for getting you to think outside of the box and avoid design fixation.

As I've said before, as you come across these amazing ideas, remember to record any design decisions so that you don't forget them.

Design ideas are not limited to be only 2D.

You can produce design ideas in 3D too, and there are a multitude of different prototyping materials that you could use, such as construction sets, breadboards, modelling clay, fabric toiles, and building bricks, cardboard, and many, many, many more.

You decide on what is right for your iterative journey, and as I said before, record any design decisions as you make them.

Time for a quick check-in.

Which design strategies may require you to attribute someone or something? A, AI, B, reverse engineering, C, primary user designing, D, collaborative designing.

Have a little think.

Come back to me when you've got an answer.

Well done if you've got A, C and D.

So the design strategies that might require you to attribute someone or something are AI, artificial intelligence, primary user designing and collaborative designing.

We want to know who or what produced the design idea.

If it wasn't you, it needs to be attributed.

Onto task B.

Number one, define design strategy.

Number two, identify suitable design strategies for your design brief.

And remember, you are not limited to the ones that I have shared today.

Part three, use a variety of design strategies to generate a range of design ideas for your iterative journey, which avoid design fixation.

Good luck, enjoy, and I can't wait to see some of your amazing design ideas.

Answers could include for part one, design strategies are methods of generating design ideas.

It is easy to become fixated on one design.

So using a variety of strategies avoids design fixation, encourages design decisions, and opens up the exciting possibilities of successful design solutions.

Part two, identify suitable design strategies for your design brief.

Sofia says, "I chose to explore biomimicry for inspiration about the way that plants disperse seeds as I would like a product to slowly release spices." This sounds like an interesting project, Sofia.

Sam says, "I have chosen to share my design brief with a range of potential stakeholders and ask them to model ideas out of toy building bricks.

I can use their ideas as a starting point to develop my designs." Great strategy there, Sam.

Part three is your chance to use a variety of design strategies to generate a range of design ideas for your iterative journey which avoid design fixation.

Remember to explain the design strategy and why you chose to use it for your iterative journey.

Attribute the person or programme or app if you need to.

Feel free to go back through these slides if you've forgotten which ones those are.

And justify your own design decisions.

Have a great time producing these ideas, and it'll be really interesting to see what you come up with.

Well done with all of your hard work on this.

This brings us to the end of our lesson today.

Let's summarise.

Design strategies are methods of generating design ideas.

It is easy to become fixated on one design, so using a variety of strategies avoids design fixation, encourages design decisions, and opens up the exciting possibilities of successful solutions.

Primary user, stakeholder designing, collaborative designing, AI, biomimicry, reverse engineering are all examples of design strategies.

And there are lots more too.

Methods for communicating design decisions include annotations, developed sketches, prototypes, analysis against design requirements, and feedback from primary user and stakeholders.

Well done with all of your hard work today, and I look forward to seeing you back for another lesson a different day.

And good luck and enjoy your iterative journeys.