In early childhood education, most parents are aware of the importance of teaching key academic skills such as early literacy and mathematics skills. Recent research also suggests that problem-solving is an equally important skillset to teach young children. While the design thinking model is implemented in K-12 education, it is relatively new in early childhood education but highly effective.
What is design thinking? Design thinking is an iterative process used to solve real-world problems. At its core, design thinking has several steps: Identify a problem, design potential solutions, test the solutions, redesign as needed and share the solutions with a wider audience. Design thinking is used regularly in many fields (engineering, business, IT, health care, etc.) and has recently gained wide popularity due to the effectiveness of this problem-solving approach.
Why is design thinking important? As pediatrician Laura Jana notes in her book, The Toddler Brain, 65 percent of today’s children will face unknown careers and problems when they are adults. Children will always need to solve problems throughout their lives and the difficulties they face will grow in complexity as they mature. Design thinking is a lifelong skill that children may use to tackle complex problems throughout their lives, so it is a valuable skill to learn early in life, particularly within the first five years. According to Dr. Jana, there is a direct connection between early skills and workforce development. The 21st century competencies valued by today’s business world are one and the same with the core social, emotional, language and executive function skills that can be fostered in early childhood. Forbes explains that design thinking is a way for businesses to increase productivity, foster innovation and eliminate wasted time and money on guesswork-based development by empowering front-line workers to collaborate on diverse teams and explore new ideas. Design thinking helps children build a resilience-focused mindset and teaches many of the 21st century skills, such as the four C’s: creativity, collaboration, compassion and confidence. These are skills children can use to address increasingly complex problems throughout their lives.
Author Recent PostsDr. Maria Shaheen, Senior Director of Early Childhood Education, Primrose SchoolsAs senior director of early childhood education at Primrose Schools, Dr. Maria Shaheen supports the development of curriculum and training for Primrose Schools, overseeing the curriculum development, student assessment, longitudinal research, and parent education. Dr. Shaheen also assists with research related to ongoing and new curriculum-related initiatives. Maria manages the curriculum portion of the Primrose Promise project, overseeing the research, design, and implementation of the journey to bring high-quality early childhood education to disadvantaged communities. Primrose Promise resonates personally for her given her commitment to social justice in education.Before joining Primrose, Maria was an assistant professor at Kennesaw State University where she taught literacy classes with integrated social justice and service learning. Her research areas included innovative teaching practices, early literacy, social justice, and teacher mentoring. Latest posts by eSchool Media Contributors (see all)
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