MAKER SPACE & DESIGN THINKING: EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES FOR ACHIEVING CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION IN SCHOOLS

Creativity and innovation are being increasingly important for the development of 21st century knowledge society. The European Commission (EC-2008c) links creativity and innovation to knowledge and sees them as essential skills to be developed in the context of life-long learning. It is no denying fact that education plays a crucial role in fostering creative and innovative skills. In the past few years, the emergence of a new wave of technologies has been observed. The rapid development and take up of technology, especially among young people has a significant impact on education, challenging educators and institutions to address the changed learning patterns and needs of the students. Hence, we see that a number of new concept and trends have emerged in the recent past, to name a few are Brain-Based learning, Inquiry-Based learning, differentiated instruction, Flipped Classrooms, Game-Based learning, Maker Education, STEM, Design Thinking (DT), Coding in the classrooms, etc., This paper provides an overview of the theoretical foundations for creativity and innovation in the context of education. It also provides the conceptual framework of two emerging technologies, namely, maker space and design thinking. It also aims to explain how these technologies play a key role in fostering a creature learning and innovative teaching environment in schools and are currently offering a variety of opportunities for constructive change. This paper attempts to answer the following questions: 1. How can we define creativity and innovation? 2. What do we understand by educational maker space? 3. What is design thinking? 4. What is the philosophy behind maker movement? 5. What are the principles underlying design thinking? 6. What are the influences of maker space and design thinking and their potential impact on education? A brief summary of the paper is as follows:. In this paper, creativity and innovation are understood as inter-related concepts, the first refers to a product or process, which shows a balance of originality and value and the second to the implementation of such a product or process in a given sphere. There are many different ways to define maker space: i. "A maker space is a place where students can gather to create, invent, tinker, explore and discover, using a variety, of tools and materials" (Diana Rendina, Defining Maker-spaces: what the Research say). ii. "Maker space provides hands on creative ways to encourage students to design, experiment, build and invent as they deeply engage in science, engineering and tinkering". (Jennifer Cooper, Designing school maker space, Edutopia). iii. Maker spaces are build on a constructive ideology as introduced by Jean Piaget and developed by Seymore Papert. The primary goal of both Constructivism and Constructionism is to have learners create their own knowledge by creating and interacting with physical objects.. "Design thinking refers to design specific cognitive activities that designers apply during the process. Design thinking is a methodology, not exclusive for designers that help people understand and develop creative ways to solve specific issues, generally, business oriented" (Wikipedia). Design process is what puts DT into action. It is a structured approach to generating and developing ideas. Creativity is central to the design process. The DT cycle involves observation to discover unmet needs within the context and constraints of a particular situation, framing the opportunities and scope of innovation, generating creative ideas, testing and refining solutions. The implications and benefits of both these technologies are many and varied. Both can empower students by helping them to shift from being passive consumers of information and products to active creators and innovators.