Streaming Session
Recorded Session1. Welcome, Hook, and Unpacking the ISTE Innovative Designer Standard for Students, with age band specific explanations for elementary classrooms. (~5-7 minutes)
2. Illuminating the 9 proven and powerful strategies for cultivating amazing PK-5 innovative designers. These strategies range from using an age-appropriate design process to the use of timing and design constraints to strategic student role-playing. Through interactive audience polling and participation, storytelling, compelling visuals, student work samples, and live demonstrations, each of these strategies will be brought to life. For example, to build on the first two strategies related to an age-appropriate design process, the attendee audience will get to vote on one of three types of structures, which the 10-year old presenter will then build live in Minecraft Education while explaining how he applies the process. All examples and live demonstrations will use age-appropriate classroom materials and technology tools for PK-5 students, including physical blocks, physical drawing/art, Minecraft Education, AI text-to-image tools, Micro:bit, 3D printing and design software like the free Tinkercad and Makers Empire apps, and sandbox-style video games. (~50 minutes total)
3. Resources and Wrapping Up (~3-5 minutes)
At the end of this high engagement, interactive session, educators will be able to:
(1) Identify 9 research-based strategies for cultivating the Innovative Designer standard and indicators with elementary students. Educators will experience in real-time how these strategies can be used and combined for students as they work across curricular areas to produce various artifacts that support both learning and assessment, including building and visual art projects, graphic design projects, digital storytelling, working virtual engineering machines, and coding activities.
(2) Describe characteristics of developmentally appropriate unplugged materials and digital technologies that can be used to facilitate these strategies, including familiarity with demonstrations, examples, and resources for at least 7 dynamic materials and edtech tools specifically for PK-5 students.
(3) Apply these strategies right away to design and implement learning experiences that cultivate the identity and outcomes of “amazing innovative designer” with their own students.
There are many, many publications that emphasize the importance of innovative design opportunities - and the use of digital technologies in such activities to overcome stereotypes around STEM fields - in elementary classrooms and beyond. Here are several examples:
STEM in Early Education: A Guide to Integrating Technology, by Nancye Blair Black, Susan Brooks-Young, and Gail Lovely (2025) - https://iste.org/steminearlyed.
Innovative Designer standard opens the door to students' imaginative, creative energy, by Paula Don (2018) - https://iste.org/blog/innovative-designer-standard-opens-the-door-to-students-imaginative-creative-energy.
The Importance of Design Thinking in Education: Sparking Creativity in Children (Arizona State University article) - https://entrepreneurship.asu.edu/blog/2024/06/27/the-importance-of-design-thinking-in-education-sparking-creativity-in-children/.
From Computational Thinking to Computational Action: Envisioning computing education that both teaches and empowers, by Mike Tissenbaum, Josh Sheldon, and Hal Abelson (2019) - https://cacm.acm.org/opinion/from-computational-thinking-to-computational-action/.
The Learner's Apprentice: AI and the Amplification of Human Creativity, by Ken Kahn (2025) - https://cmkpress.com/product/learners-apprentice/.
Stereotypes in STEM Fields Start by Age Six (2021) - https://uh.edu/news-events/stories/2021/november-2021/11222021-stem-stereotypes-study.php.
A Framework for Incorporating the “Learning How to Learn” Approach in Teaching STEM Education (2023) - https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7102/13/1/1.
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