Round Robin Brainstorm Activity

Objective: Generate a wide variety of ideas by building upon each other's thoughts.

Time: 5 minutes

Instructions:

1. Form Groups: Get into groups of 3-4 students.
2. Define the Challenge: Your teacher will present a challenge or problem statement. (e.g., "How can we reduce food waste in our school cafeteria?")
3. Start Writing: Each student will silently write down one idea on a piece of paper related to the challenge.
4. Pass and Add: After 30 seconds, pass your paper to the person on your right.
5. Build or New: When you receive a paper, read the idea(s) on it. You can either:
   • Add a new idea that builds on what's already there (e.g., make it more specific, add a new angle).
   • Write a completely new idea if you can't think of a way to build on the existing one.
6. Keep Passing: Continue passing the papers and adding ideas for about 4 minutes. Focus on quantity and diverse thinking!
7. Review: When time is called, review the papers in your group. You should have many ideas generated collectively!

Crazy 8s Sprint Game

Objective: Rapidly generate multiple distinct ideas, pushing past initial thoughts.

Time: 5 minutes

Instructions:

1. Fold Your Paper: Take a blank sheet of paper and fold it in half three times. When you unfold it, you should have 8 equal sections.

2. The Challenge: Your teacher will provide a new challenge or you can continue with the previous one. (e.g., "How can we make learning more fun in class?")

3. 8 Ideas, 8 Minutes: Your goal is to sketch or write one unique idea in each of the 8 sections of your paper. You will have approximately 45 seconds per idea. Don't worry about perfection; focus on getting an idea down!

   • Section 1:
     
     
     
     
     
     
   • Section 2:
     
     
     
     
     
     
   • Section 3:
     
     
     
     
     
     
   • Section 4:
     
     
     
     
     
     
   • Section 5:
     
     
     
     
     
     
   • Section 6:
     
     
     
     
     
     
   • Section 7:
     
     
     
     
     
     
   • Section 8:
     
     
     
     
     
     

4. No Stopping: Keep your pen moving! If you get stuck, try a really wild idea, or think about a different aspect of the problem.

5. Review: Once time is up, look at your 8 ideas. You might be surprised at what you came up with!

Idea Matrix Selector Worksheet

Objective: Systematically evaluate your generated ideas to select the most promising ones.

Instructions:

1. List Your Top Ideas: From your Round Robin and Crazy 8s sessions, choose your top 5-7 ideas and write them in the "Idea" column below.
2. Define Your Criteria: Work with your group or individually to decide on 2-3 key criteria for evaluating your ideas. These should be factors that make an idea "good" or "successful" for the given challenge (e.g., Feasibility, Impact, Originality, Cost-Effectiveness, Enjoyment, etc.). Write your chosen criteria in the "Criteria 1", "Criteria 2", and "Criteria 3" columns.
3. Score Each Idea: For each idea, score it against each criterion using a scale of 1-5 (1 = Low, 5 = High). Be honest and objective!
4. Calculate Total Score: Add up the scores for each idea to get a total.
5. Identify Top Three: The ideas with the highest total scores are your top contenders!

My Idea Matrix

My Top Three Ideas:

1. Idea:
   
   
   
   
   Why this made the cut (brief rationale):
   
   
   
   
   
   

2. Idea:
   
   
   
   
   Why this made the cut (brief rationale):
   
   
   
   
   
   

3. Idea:
   
   
   
   
   Why this made the cut (brief rationale):
   
   
   
   
   
   

Top Three Idea Record

Objective: Reflect on your selected ideas and the process of divergent and convergent thinking.

Instructions:

1. Your Best Idea: From your Idea Matrix Selector Worksheet, write down your single top idea here.

   My #1 Idea:
   
   
   
   

   Why did you choose this as your absolute top idea? What makes it stand out?
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

2. The Power of Two: List your other two top ideas from the worksheet.

   My #2 Idea:
   
   
   
   

   My #3 Idea:
   
   
   
   

3. Reflect on the Process: How did using both divergent (brainstorming) and convergent (matrix) thinking help you arrive at these top ideas? What was challenging or surprising about the process?