Lesson video

Hello, and welcome to lesson four of your design and technology lesson.

I am Mrs. Mee, and I'm going to be your design and technology teacher.

And today we're going to be looking at exploring a design brief and exploring design ideas.

So, previously, what we've looked at is we've looked at what electrical systems are.

We've also looked at mechanical systems, and we've looked at things like components.

We've looked at inputs, outputs, and processes within an electrical system and a mechanical system.

And if you remember, we connected the electrical system to a mechanical system to make it work.

And what we looked at is the fact that the speed of the component that moved the mechanical system was too fast, and we looked at the need to control it.

And last lesson, we looked at how to control key components in an electrical circuit that might power a mechanical system.

Do you remember what component we used to make our mechanical system move? That's right, we used a motor.

So we used a motor to make it move.

Now what we're going to do today is we're actually going to look at our own design brief.

So we're going to look at a design brief and you're going to start exploring some ideas.

So would you like to get started? Brilliant, let's have a look at what today's lesson will entail.

Okay, so what we're going to explore in today's lesson, we're actually going to look at responding to a design brief and we're actually going to explore some ideas.

But before we do, we have got lots of other things to think about in relation to the brief.

So let's have a look at what we're going to need for today's lesson.

So the first thing you're going to need is you're going to need to make sure that you do follow these rules today.

When you're exploring and developing ideas in design and technology, make sure you explore and experiment, have fun, be confident.

Don't worry if you can't visualise it, there are lots of ways in which we can communicate our ideas.

But remember to be confident and play safe.

So, in this lesson, what you're going to need is you're going to need paper or an exercise book, and you are going to need a pencil.

So if you pause the video, go off and make sure you've got those things, when you're ready, come back to me and we'll start today's lesson.

Excellent.

So have you got everything you need? Brilliant.

Let's begin.

Let's take a look at some of the things that we're going to look at.

So you've previously done the intro quiz and I hope you did well at that.

What we're going to look at first is we're going to look at what our design and make activity is.

Once we've looked at that, we're going to just explore the problem in a little bit.

So, what is it asking us to do? Once we've explored the problem, we'll go into create a design specification.

And then once you've specified what your ideas will do and how they'll look, then we're actually going to explore developing a range of ideas.

So, the keywords that we're going to use today.

The first keyword we're going to use is called smart device.

Now, this is a electronic device that is able to connect, share, and interact with its users.

So we're going to look at that word today.

We're also going to look at the word recycle, and this is converting waste into reusable material.

We're going to look at the word specification, and this is a list of points to describe how the product will function, the purpose of it, and who this product is going to be designed for.

We're also going to create some concepts.

Concepts are a range of quick ideas that can be communicated through sketching or discussing them or even modelling them if you're struggling to sketch them.

So, first activity we're going to look at today is the design and make activity.

So let's have a look at what we're going to be asked to design and make today.

So, here is your brief.

We would like you to design and make a smart device to encourage young people to recycle.

So before we start, let's just break down what that's asking us to do.

Let's think about what is a smart device.

What do we mean by recycling and why do we need to recycle? So, smart device, young children, and recycle.

Let's just break those things down.

What do we mean by a smart device? Is a smart device a device that knows everything? Or is a smart device an electronic gadget that interacts, connects, and is able to share with its user and other smart devices? Which option would you say is a smart device? Is it something that knows everything or is it something that's able to connect with an end-user or interacts with an end-user? That's right, a smart device is an electronic gadget that can interact, connect with a user and other smart devices.

Now let's have a look at some smart devices.

Do you know what this smart device is here onscreen? That's right, it's an Alexa.

So some of you may have seen one or you may even have one.

So let's explore how Alexa connects, shares, and interacts with its users and other smart devices.

What does it do? How does it connect? Have a little think about how it's smart.

Have you had a little think? So, let's share some of my thoughts, and let's see if yours are the same.

And if they're not the same, that doesn't matter.

There's no right or wrong.

Now, I can actually make Alexa work by speaking to her.

It does connect to other devices, doesn't it? So it interacts with other smart devices.

It can recognise my voice.

I can ask her questions.

It can control other smart devices, so it can control my lights.

It's got a speaker.

It's got lights.

And it allows me to say, "Alexa, can you find.

." It's really exciting, isn't it, Alexa? Now let's have a look at another smart device.

Here I've got an Apple Watch, and this is a product that Mrs. Mee has actually got as well.

How does the Apple Watch connect, share, and interact with its user and other smart devices? What can an Apple Watch do? Do you know? Have a little think.

Let me share some of my ideas with you.

Now, an Apple Watch, again, has voice recognition.

It connects to other devices.

It controls other smart devices, e.

g.

a phone, so I can control my phone.

It alerts me, so it sends vibrations or sounds.

It's got light, and it actually can measure my steps and heart rate.

Now, are just some of the things that an Apple Watch can do.

It can do lots of other things.

It's really quite smart.

But what's really key is it can connect to my phone, and my phone can connect to my computer.

So everything is connected through Wi-Fi.

Okay, so there's two products that we've looked at.

Can you explore smart devices? What key functions do they have to allow the user to interact with them and other smart devices? Have a little think.

So, here I've got another smart device that I have within my home.

Do you know what that is? That's right, it's a Nintendo Switch.

Have you got any smart devices in your home? Have a little think about devices that are able to connect and allow you to interact with the end-user? Have a little think about things that you might have in your home.

Pause the video if you need to.

Have a look around the home, come back to me with some ideas.

Brilliant.

So you've had a look.

Let's have a look at some other smart devices that Mrs. Mee has looked at.

So, there are lots of smart products that you can get in your home, and you could actually have what we call a smart home, where the entire home actually interacts with its users.

Here we have a Nintendo Wii, which is smart because it detects movement, doesn't it? So we need to develop a smart device to encourage young children.

So what can we encourage them to do? What can we do? Jot down some of your ideas.

What can we do to encourage children, to interact? Now, we're trying to encourage them to recycle.

What can we do? Have a little think.

Excellent.

Have you had a little think? So let's explore some of the ideas Mrs. Mee had.

Make it fun.

Definitely, make it fun.

Hopefully you had that same idea too.

We've got to make it interactive, haven't we, if we're going to get young people to try and interact with it.

Sound would be good.

Light would be good.

Colours, bright colours would be good, wouldn't it? Yes, you could turn it into a game.

And movement would also be good.

So what ideas have you had that you could do to your smart device to make it suitable for young children? Now let's explore the idea of gamification.

Have you ever heard of the word gamification? Gamification is the application of game-design elements and game principles in non-game contexts.

It can be also defined as a set of activities and processes to solve problems by using and applying characteristics of game elements.

So let's explore it a little bit more.

Could we engage young children in recycling by turning the process into a game? What ideas do you have? How could you turn the idea of recycling into a game? Pause the video, jot down some of your ideas, and then let me know.

Brilliant.

Did you have some ideas? Let's have a listen.

Fantastic.

Shall I share with you what I've got? Points.

Did you say that? Yes, it'd be really good if you could get points.

It could be linked to rewards, couldn't it? Yeah.

You could do a basketball or netball game.

You could like shoot the hoops and shoot the recycling items into a container.

You could have a leaderboard, so we could have the best young person in the household to recycle.

We could have targets, that's right.

So it could be a challenge where you've got to hit a target.

There's all sorts of ideas, isn't there, that you could do to turn it into a game.

Now let's consider recycling then.

What do we need to think about in terms of recycling? What are your first thoughts? So we need to create a smart device for young people and we need to get them to recycle.

What are your thoughts? Pause the video and just jot down any ideas that you have about recycling.

Brilliant.

Have you had time to think? Have you jotted down some ideas? Excellent.

Right.

Let me share with you what ideas Mrs. Mee's had.

Sort materials.

We need to sort materials.

We could do some containers to hold the recycled materials.

Labels, maybe? Colours, good idea.

Colours could be key.

We've got to inform them, haven't we? Which container to put which item in.

So there're lots of things to think about when we're recycling.

Now, let's just explore the problem a little bit further in terms of recycling 'cause it's a big issue, isn't it? Why is it important that we recycle? Do you know? Now, the average household in the UK produces more than a tonne of waste every year.

Do you know what that looks like? That together, put this together, it's a total of 31 million tonnes per year waste.

This is equivalent to the weight of 3.

5 million double-decker buses, a queue of which would go around the world 2.

5 times.

That's how much waste we create.

It's a lot of waste, isn't it? So it's really important that we recycle.

So this is a picture on a landfill site.

Now, to help you understand what one tonne looks like, one tonne is equivalent to 1,000 kilogrammes.

And to find the equivalent of a kilogramme, just go and get a bag of sugar from your cupboard.

One bag of sugar is generally a kilogramme.

Can you find a kilogramme weight and hold it and just feel how heavy it is.

Just think and just consider 1,000 of those weights.

One kilogramme is one bag of sugar.

So we could produce 1,000 bags of sugar worth of waste each year, that's how much waste we're creating.

What is waste made up of then? What's in our waste? Food, yes.

Packaging, clothing, and other products, so all of our other products that we might use such as when we're finished with electronic products, all of these are waste and they do need to be recycled.

It's really important that we recycle all of our waste, and packaging is a massive one, isn't it? So where does it all go? Where does it end up if we don't recycle? That's right.

In a big fat heap on a landfill.

So, it ends up on a landfill like this one, and there are many issues.

So, first of all, it doesn't look very nice.

And it takes up a lot of land space.

But the other thing is it smells.

So if you live near a landfill, it's really, really stinky.

And the other thing which is really crucial is it lets off a lot of pollution.

A lot of harmful gases are let off into the atmosphere by the waste.

Each household produces more than one tonne of waste.

I still can't get over that.

So what can be recycled? Plastics, metals, cardboards and paper, food can be recycled, fabrics, glass, but not everything can be recycled.

But we need to think about what we can recycle and how we can encourage young people to recycle.

So we've looked at smart devices and we've looked at exploring the problem.

So what solutions are already out there? That's what we need to think about.

I want you to research existing recycling solutions.

Have a little look on the internet, and make sure you've got an adult to help you.

And you are going to look for different recycling solutions that you can have in your home.

Pause the video, have a go at researching.

When you finish, come back to me.

So here are some of the containers that Mrs. Mee has collected, just to give you an idea.

And here's my pictures just to help you.

So as you can see on those pictures, we've got different colours, we've got information to inform, we've got different ways of dispensing the recycled items. So lots of ideas.

So once you've finished, resume the video, and we will continue this lesson.

Excellent.

So have you had a good look at different recycling containers? And hopefully, you've got some ideas, and you might even want to, if you're able to, to print those ideas off.

So now we're going to look at creating a specification.

So let's have a look at what that is.

So now we've explored the design brief and the problem.

We're going to begin to specify what we can do to address the problem.

So we've looked at what smart devices are.

We've looked at the issue of recycling, and we know what young people want.

Surely, you're a young person, so think about you as an end-user.

What you need to do now is you need to create a short specific sentence to describe how you're going to address the main points in the brief.

So let me go through this to help you.

Smart device.

How will you develop a product that connects, shares, and interacts with the user? So you need to create a short sentence for that.

Young children.

You will need to specify an age and how will you address their needs.

Encourage to recycle.

What will you do to help encourage children? You then also need to consider the function, don't you? Specify how your product will work.

How will it separate waste? How will you get your waste in and out of the products? Appearance.

Specify the appearance.

What colours, shapes, what key writing styles might you use? The other thing we need to think about is materials.

Specify the material you will use.

So you need to create a short specific sentence to describe each of the following.

So pause the video, have a go at doing this, I've displayed all of the key headings on there, so a short sentence for each of those headings.

Pause the video, have a go.

And when you've done that, we'll resume and I will show you the specification I've created.

Brilliant.

Have you had a go? So shall I share with you what I've created for my specification? So this sheet here is a blank sheet that you can download and actually jot your ideas in if you want to.

And this is Mrs. Mee's example that she created.

So, I've created and I've filled in a single sentence for each of those specification points, and I've broken them down for you.

Oops, let's go back, apologies.

So the first point.

The product must be programmed to interact with the user using an LED display and sound.

The product must be aimed at children four to 14.

That's what I felt was the key age, because I think older children generally have that, are hopefully already doing that.

The product is designed to help children easily separate items. It has a closing mechanism that doesn't require them to touch.

I think that's important.

Colours to indicate the different materials, and it needs to be made from a material that's easily cleaned.

So that's Mrs. Mee's example.

Hopefully you've finished your example now.

So let's look at exploring some ideas.

So let's explore some ideas to address the specification for a smart device to encourage children to recycle.

So remember, my specification, in my specification, I specified that the smart device must be programmed to interact with the user using an LED display and sound.

Now remember, when Mrs. Mee creates a smart device, it won't be a Nintendo Switch, it won't be a smart home, it will be a prototype.

The product needs to be aimed at children four to 14.

It needs to easily separate the items. Closing mechanism does not require the young person to touch.

So I've just got to remind myself of all of these things.

Colours to indicate different materials.

It made from a material that's easily cleaned.

So let's have a go at exploring some ideas.

Now, I would like you now to take a piece of paper and a pencil, and I would like you to do your magic and start exploring ideas.

So, I wouldn't like you to pause the video at this point.

You might want to pause it if you've not got your paper at the ready, but Mrs. Mee's going to just show you a video of how she created some ideas, some quick concepts, for her design brief and to address her specification points.

So as you can see, I've used a single sheet of A4 paper.

And what you can see is I've actually used research to help me develop ideas, and I'm writing "Design Ideas" as my title, and I'm creating one idea to begin with.

So Mrs. Mee is using 3-D illustrating techniques.

Now, if you can't draw it in 3-D, that doesn't matter.

Have a go at drawing it in 2-D.

But Mrs. Mee is using three-dimensional technique for illustrating her first idea.

And as you can see, I'm trying to make the first idea attractive to the end-user, and how have I done that? Yes, I've turned it into sort of an animation.

I've given it eyes and a mouth.

And as you can see, there's my three ideas that I've created.

And once you've created your ideas, you might want to add colour to communicate to the end-user of what the idea might look like.

So Mrs. Mee is adding colour to each of her ideas.

And once you've added colour, voila, you can then think about how are you going to communicate how it does what it should do.

So Mrs. Mee is annotating her ideas now, just to sort of inform the user what I've done to address those key specification points.

So I'm just labelling simply, to say what each of the things does.

So, LED lights in the eyes, hinged lid, different coloured lids, and you'll see that I've illustrated the different four containers rather than drawing all of them.

So, have a go at developing a page of ideas.

Pause the video.

When you're finished, resume.

Brilliant.

Did you have a go at developing your ideas? Fantastic.

So, here is Mrs. Mee's finished ideas as you can see.

So there's my ideas.

I've annotated them, I've added colour, and I've actually used a fine liner around the edge to actually pick out those ideas.

And you'll notice that I've stopped down some research that are used to inspire my ideas.

So hopefully you've had a go at creating some ideas, and hopefully, you've now got a clear specification, listed all of the criteria for each of your ideas, and you've got a quick page of ideas to demonstrate your initial concepts.

So we've explored quite a lot today, haven't we? You've completed the intro quiz.

I've introduced you to the design and make activity.

We've explored the problem of recycling, and we've looked at and tried to define what a smart device is.

You've created a specification, and you've also created and explored a range of ideas.

I hope you've enjoyed today's lesson.

If you'd like to share anything, please ask an adult to take a picture of your work and share it on Twitter @OakNational using the hashtag #LearnwithOak.

Thank you for joining me in today's lesson, and I look forward to seeing you next lesson, where we're going to look at developing some of those design ideas.

Goodbye!.