Design Week
DESIGN WEEK
Our DESIGN Weeks provide students with an extended amount of time to engage in the design thinking process as they participate in art and engineering activities. It is during these weeks that students use their math, reading, and writing skills as they ask questions, research, and think creatively and flexibly.
We start in Kindergarten with students learning the design thinking process modeled after the Engineering is Elementary Curriculum, developed by the Museum of Science in Boston. In addition, they are developing stress management, self regulation, relationship skills, a sense of belonging, and academic tenacity.
As students move to 5th and 6th grade, they engage in larger long term projects that start with students noticing a need in our community or world and empathizing with the end user. They start to engage in the design thinking process modeled after the Stanford Design School. Students see school as relevant and connected to our world, as they develop resilience, curiosity, and self-direction.
On the Wednesday of a grade level's DESIGN Week, students participate in a community connected experience. Starting in the primary grades in Kindergarten, this typically is a field trip connected to the learning students will engage in during their next 6 weeks of CORE, but as students become more sophisticated this might turn into a off site visit with a community partner that is related to the DESIGN projects students are working on.
We hope to make connections with our Santa Barbara Community, so that students are gaining learning experiences in all walks of life, and not just within the 4 walls of the classroom.
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