«There are plenty of ideation techniques available. Use the Internet for research and choose three that you would like to try in the future or have used before. Describe how they work in no less than a paragraph.»
I had never heard of the word «ideation» before but I did some research and learned that it is the creative process of making new ideas. So its basically something that I’ve been doing many times before. There is apparantly a lot of different ways to to it though, Ive always just used brainstorming before that I can remember. Its good to know that they are so many techniques out there to try if Im stuck. The three techniques I wanted to learn more about is the 6-3-5 method, sketch and SCAMPER.
The 6-3-5 method is great for teamwork. It requires six people (it might work with other numbers of people as well) and then each person writes three ideas or solutions to a problem on a piece of paper, which after five minutes gets passed on to the next person. Then that person builds on top of the already existing ideas on the paper they received. This is supposed to be repeated until every participant has had every piece of paper once. Finally the best ideas gets used. This is great for including everyones ideas, since everyone has participated.
The sketch technique is exactly what it sounds like. Its all about quick sketches instead of writing everything in words when you or your team is looking for new ideas. They say that «visuals have a way of provoking further ideas and providing a wider lens of thinking». You are using your brain a bit different when you’re drawing then when you’re writing and for some it may be easier to get creative when you’re drawing instead. Its supposed to be rough sketches though, it doesn’t have to look good. When I think about it I use this ideation technique quite often now as I find I quickly loose my train of thought when I’m just writing my ideas down.
SCAMPER stand for:
Substitute something
Combine it with something else
Adapt something to it
Modify or Magnify it
Put to other uses
Eliminate something
Reverse or Rearrange it
This technique is a brainstorming technique that is used to make or improve already existing products. We are going to learn more about this method and use it in the next learning task. You simply go down the list and ask yourself or your team questions regarding each element. An example is if we are trying to improve a notepad. We are starting at the first element which is «substitute something», maybe we can substitute the paper for something else? I recently saw an add for a notepad that had pages made of some kind of stone (but it was still thin as paper) and the pages were rip and spill proof. Then you continue through the elements and hopefully end up with some good ideas.
AHV design 