I believe I met this standard of being an Innovative Designer because I designed an assignment solely based on problems regarding motivation in terms of the "rider" and the "elephant" while also trying to meet South Dakota state content standards. When creating my assignment for the "elephant," I really had to think outside the box about what my students would want when writing a story. I generated a few ideas for my students by giving them some guiding questions to help get their stories rolling while also allowing them to let their creativity drive the story. I also gave them a picture to use as a reference while writing. The assignment for the "elephant" was incredibly open-ended compared to the assignment for the "rider." I didn't give my "elephant" too much to work with, because I wanted them to tell a story with details that they felt were important, because, on the other hand, the assignment for the "rider" really limits what they can write about because it had to be a real event that they experienced and it had to meet specific criteria that may stress the student while writing. I also gave my "rider" a specific deadline and didn't allow them peer intervention. I left it up to them to fix their mistakes on their own time, whereas the "elephant" had access to in-class peer reviews to allow the students to communicate with one another on each story's strengths and weaknesses. In other words, I had a physical process implemented for my "elephants" to keep them motivated toward writing their stories to meet the SD content standard. My "rider" had to find their own way to persevere with a constructed assignment, but my "elephant" had several ways to guide their perseverance and create their own story to meet the state standard for telling a story.

I would use the "rider" vs. the "elephant" to enhance the kinds of lessons and materials I want to give to my students. I would do this by changing the layout of my assignments and how I word things throughout the assignment, and vary the material itself so the assignment isn't the same every time and students don't get bored of it.