Development, implementation, and evaluation of an interaction design thinking course in the context of secondary education

Design thinking aims to foster innovation by elevating participants’ creative thinking abilities. It usually involves a problem-solving approach to solve complex problems, which can be best achieved through collaborative and human-centered activities. In post-secondary education, design-thinking techniques and practices have been implemented into different curricula as particular skills that need to be learned in the 21st century. However, little work has been conducted to investigate design thinking in secondary education. This thesis reports on a successful development, implementation, and evaluation of an interaction design-thinking curriculum in the context of secondary education. Over the course of three months, 39 students from two schools in grades 9 and 10 participated in the course. Several types of data sources, including in-depth interviews, participant observation, focus group, open-ended questions, questionnaires, and visual method were employed to gather data, and the data was coded for distinguishing core concepts and categories. The results of the study clarify the course benefit for students and inform interaction design educators and researchers about how to best develop, implement, and evaluate a secondary-level course on interaction design thinking. This study presents several important research contributions. First, it demonstrates how students’ design thinking skills can be incorporated into their everyday life experiences and practices. Second, the findings of the study shed light on design thinking evaluation, and how design educators and interaction design practitioners can evaluate participants’ design thinking skills and abilities through different data collection methods in depth. Third, this study provides an analytical lens in examining and adapting a design thinking curriculum in the context of secondary education. Furthermore, this study provides four substantial recommendations to design educators for implementation of a design thinking-based curriculum.