Design thinking is a great way to help students develop empathy towards others and to design solutions that help other people. 3D modelling with Makers Empire allows students to express their creative ideas and make designs that communicate their interests, opinions and thoughts about important issues in their lives. At Makers Empire we value diversity and actively encourage acceptance and participation of students from all backgrounds, cultures, genders, and abilities.
Many of our lesson plans, design challenges, and monthly competitions ask students to design something for another person. By working through the design process in these activities, students develop empathy for each other and put their own needs aside to design something for someone else. They might create something that another person likes or needs, solves a problem for others, or expresses their gratitude for a friend or community member.
In this post, we will share some of our favourite ways that Makers Empire promotes learning experiences that are inclusive, human-centred, and encourage students to embrace diversity in their communities.
2. Makers Empire's Lesson Plans
Our lesson plans are written in an open-ended fashion to allow for maximum participation and inclusivity.Â
For example, Our Let’s Get Decorated lesson plan asks students to design a decoration to help celebrate a holiday that is important to their own family. Students of all cultures, background and religions are equally catered for in this lesson, while having the opportunity to learn about and understand celebrations and special days that are important to other students.
If you’re a Makers Empire customer, you can download the lesson plan from the Teacher Dashboard. Some other Makers Empire lesson plans that ask students to think about important people in their lives and express gratitude are How full is Your Bucket? and Gratitude Cards.
3. School Case Studies
We have hundreds of case studies detailing how schools are using Makers Empire together with the design thinking process to solve real-world problems for people in their communities. Develop empathy by understanding the experiences of others through deep insights and observations is central to the Design Thinking process.
We are encouraged by primary school students developing solutions for people living with a disability:
We’ve also been impressed by designs for real-world contexts such as students designing a new school playground which is accessible for all students:
We also cheer on these students who have created arm guards to help wheelchair athletes.
4. Avatars
Finally, a great way to glimpse the diversity we encourage and promote at Makers Empire is to check out the amazing array of avatars students create to represent themselves in the app. These avatars are as diverse as our students themselves with every colour, shape, size and fashion sense represented and celebrated.
