Students identify extreme users.
Students learn about narrative and storytelling components.
Students apply their knowledge of storytelling components and identify them in their problems.
When you speak with and observe extreme users, their needs are amplified and their work-arounds are often more notable. This helps you pull out meaningful needs that may not pop when engaging with the middle of the bell curve. However, the needs that are uncovered through extreme users are often also needs of a wider population.
In addition students reflect on the narrative components presented in the previous section and the Inventor Video. They will go a step further and analyze their previous work based on those components, identifying what components they might have included in their Presentation Organizer and which ones are missing. They will then identify what changes might be required in order to incorporate aspects of narrative that present their problem more as a story to be shared with an audience.
Activity 1 (Budget 30 minutes)
Students recognize how to identify extreme users.
1. Teacher explains that determining who is an extreme user starts with considering what Area of Interest (AoI) of your design challenge you want to explore to an extreme. Show the question on slide one of the Extreme Users PPT and show from 7:37 to 8:34 of the Shopping Cart Redesign video to see user interview snippets. Facilitate a class discussion on AoI for the shopping cart redesign.
2. On slide two facilitate a discussion on an extreme user characteristic stated toward the end of the excerpt from 8:00 to 8:34 of the video.
3. Show from 18:15 to 19:16 of the video to show the final cart redesign prototype. Then facilitate a class discussion using slide three on how the "professional shopper" extreme user influenced the prototype design. Then summarize the importance of extreme users with slide 4.
4. Have the students define a different AoI for each member of their team and define an extreme user and put this information on the left side of their Extreme User worksheet. After they have gone out and done interviews with extreme users they can do the Extreme Users Group Empathy Map on the right side of the worksheet.
Activity 2 (Budget 25 minutes)
Students discuss the role of storytelling in communicating information and the benefits of presenting a problem as a story.
1. Teacher shows the students this Inventor Video Clip of a student who designed a simple invention to keep his grandfather safe (stop at 2:20). Ask the students why they think the presenter chose to start with their family story.
Teacher points out to the students that presenting problems as stories as in the case of the inventor clip, can help engage an audience, because the audience can see, feel and understand how that problems connects to them in a meaningful way. Presenting problems as stories means that you can use the same tools that make good storytelling to the presentation of problems.
2. Teacher engages in a discussion with students about the most common elements of storytelling included in the Inventor clip they just watched, through the following questions:
Stories commonly have a theme, topic or underlying meaning. What do you think is the theme or themes of this story?
Stories also have characters. These are the people involved in a story. Who are the characters or players in this story? (Examples: Inventor/speaker, grandfather, aunt, the family)
Stories also have settings. These can be the place or places/context where the story takes place. It can also be a geographical location like a city, also a year or a time of the day when the story occurs. What were some settings in this story? (Examples: Physical: park, house, grandfather room. In terms of time, when the inventor was 4 years old, when the grandfather would get up)
Good stories might also have plots. Those are events that happen in the story that can increase drama and therefore impact people hearing the story. It helps the audience engage emotionally. What do you think were important events in this story that helped increase drama in the audience? (Examples: When the grandfather gets lost, when the situation becomes worse and the inventor is scared for his safety and the well-being of the aunt).
Stories also have a narrator and an audience. Who is the narrator and who is the audience in this story?
The teacher shows the students the Inventor Video Storytelling Components and at the same time plays the Inventor Video Clip again, so the students can see side by side how these components of storytelling were used in the the inventor's presentation.
Activity 1.4.2 (Budget 30 minutes)
Students apply their knowledge of narrative components to their problems.
1. Students use the Storytelling Components student worksheet in order to guide them on identifying what aspects of their problem could elements of good narratives or storytelling. Students should complete each question in the handout and share their results with another student pair.