Generating Tool

Attribute Listing

What we did • We used the attributes of a

pizza and generated many unusual options for new pizza creations.

• We came up with new suggestions for the crust, sauce, cheese and toppings on a pizza.

• I told them that Waypoint Pizza needed some new recipes. We also would be presenting our creations to them when we visited there on our field trip.

• I choose this task because I could tie it to a real world event, our field trip.

• The generating process took 20 minutes.

Problem Solving PreferencesThe class definitely understood

what I meant when I said ‘new’ ideas and they had very unusual suggestions.

Very few children offered useful or ordinary ideas. Only two students out of 19 created typical pizzas.

About 17 of the pizzas were not truly edible.

The conversation was animated and energetic.

What were the results?Did you select the tools wisely?Apply them effectively? Were the results satisfactoryto you and the group? • Attribute listing was a perfect

tool to generate many unusual options.

• I needed to stress the useful aspect of the assignment.

• The students loved the process and enjoyed designing their pizzas.

• Everyone was pleased with the results until we needed to select a novel and useful pizza recipe.

• We ended up creating a menu to offer Waypoint pizza that included all of our novel ideas for pizzas.

• The owner of Waypoint Pizza promised to display our menu and enjoyed our original pizza ideas.

The Real World Connection

Would you do it differently if you were starting over? How?

• Next time I will mention that they need to also consider the useful element of creative problem solving.

• I could of used a focusing tool to help the students select from the large array of choices we generated.

• The linking together of alike ideas and combinations was an overlooked step. This was a mistake.

• The students didn’t narrow down the options in a thoughtful way.