In 2019 I was contacted by the team behind DesignWeek@School, a Dutch organisation working to help children develop 21st-Century skills. For groupsage 10-12 we developed a 'Sustainable Design Challenge,' where kids applied design thinking to target sustainability issues. This resulted in a one-week program, which we supported with an app + tablets + VR sets, and also a box of craft materials, to support paper prototypes of solutions and sketches.
I came on board to add a story context to the challenge, and applied gamification strategies to nudge pupils onwards. After agreeing on the tone of voice, the choice of media and more, I wrote scripts for video content that progressed the story, and thus the kids' progress.
All in all, I feel we delivered a pretty good concept, which found success in dozens of schools since. The 'learning by doing' concept behind the challenge, and the framing of the challenge in terms of a space mission, enticed kids to enthusiastically engage, and explore ideas to counter the sustainability issues at hand. For more info (in Dutch), see the DesignWeek@School website.
