Week 4 Journal

This week I learned about Design Thinking. This model is a process, an action. Anyone can use Design Thinking to create options and solve problems. It has four steps: Define the problem, Create and Consider many options, Refine selected directions and pick the winner. I also learned about building creative confidence and that we can all be creative if we practice and don't worry about judgement from others. 


I liked David Kelley's video "How to Build Your Creative Confidence". I was shocked and saddened with the story of his friend in grade school making a clay horse and a girl on the table telling him he did it wrong and it didn't look like a horse. I think this happens all the time. We have all probably been in a similar situation where someone said something to us or maybe we were the ones who said something like that to someone else. It makes me sad. It really only takes that happening once for our confidence to be destroyed. I also liked when he talked about helping people with their fear of snakes. That was so interesting to me. His experience shows that it is possible for us and others to overcome our fears and gain confidence. 

Design Thinking is an important skill in social innovation because it is a process that can help us ask questions and find a solution. Design Thinking is about immersing ourselves in the situation to really figure out what the problem is. Then the process encourages coming up with many ideas, being creative. Then discovering which one will work and going for it. This process can help in social innovation as we consider social problems and how to find solutions. 

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