Design Thinking and its Integration in an ESL classroom
Date Issued
May 2019
Author(s)
Abstract
Design-Thinking is a method becoming popular in education nowadays, aiming at allowing
learners to engage, discover problems on a given topic and find a solution for it. This
innovative method escapes from the traditional teaching methods used by educators, allowing
learners to expand their knowledge by thinking, engaging and developing. This dissertation
introduces the use of Design-Thinking in an English as a Second Language classroom (ESL).
This research aims to illustrate how is Design-Thinking implemented in an ESL classroom
through the use of design-based research and the collection of data through researcher`s
classroom observations, student`s reflections and instructor`s reflection, what are students`
perceptions of Design-Thinking towards the Design-Thinking activities introduced in the
classroom, what role(s) do students and instructor encompass in an ESL Design-Thinking
classroom and how is Design-Thinking implemented in an ESL classroom. It introduced
learners to a number of Design-Thinking tasks which were implemented four times by the
researcher/instructor. Within each implementation changes took place based on the collected
results after each implementation in order to improve each activity. These changes, therefore,
allow the instructor to discover whether or not design based activities can serve for a new way
of teaching language learners a topic and escaping from the traditional teaching methods. The
developed activities are to give educators a new point of view of design thinking as an
example of what can be used in the language teaching environment. The activities were
designed to meet the student's needs, aiming in helping them discover problems on a given
topic, engage and work collaboratively on providing the correct solution to it. Favourable results were collected from the implementation of Design-Thinking by the instructor for the
purpose of this study. What is more, from the use of Design-Thinking and design-based
activities,the researcher has developed a guide for instructors, providing information on the
steps to be followed for the successful creation of a Design-Thinking task and its
implementation in class. This is hence one of the main outputs of this paper. from the
obtained results, it has been concluded that Design-Thinking is well perceived from learners
in the ESL classroom, allowing them to ecompas more as instructors/explorers rather than
students and hence help them perceive well information and the usage of a new teaching
method in class.
learners to engage, discover problems on a given topic and find a solution for it. This
innovative method escapes from the traditional teaching methods used by educators, allowing
learners to expand their knowledge by thinking, engaging and developing. This dissertation
introduces the use of Design-Thinking in an English as a Second Language classroom (ESL).
This research aims to illustrate how is Design-Thinking implemented in an ESL classroom
through the use of design-based research and the collection of data through researcher`s
classroom observations, student`s reflections and instructor`s reflection, what are students`
perceptions of Design-Thinking towards the Design-Thinking activities introduced in the
classroom, what role(s) do students and instructor encompass in an ESL Design-Thinking
classroom and how is Design-Thinking implemented in an ESL classroom. It introduced
learners to a number of Design-Thinking tasks which were implemented four times by the
researcher/instructor. Within each implementation changes took place based on the collected
results after each implementation in order to improve each activity. These changes, therefore,
allow the instructor to discover whether or not design based activities can serve for a new way
of teaching language learners a topic and escaping from the traditional teaching methods. The
developed activities are to give educators a new point of view of design thinking as an
example of what can be used in the language teaching environment. The activities were
designed to meet the student's needs, aiming in helping them discover problems on a given
topic, engage and work collaboratively on providing the correct solution to it. Favourable results were collected from the implementation of Design-Thinking by the instructor for the
purpose of this study. What is more, from the use of Design-Thinking and design-based
activities,the researcher has developed a guide for instructors, providing information on the
steps to be followed for the successful creation of a Design-Thinking task and its
implementation in class. This is hence one of the main outputs of this paper. from the
obtained results, it has been concluded that Design-Thinking is well perceived from learners
in the ESL classroom, allowing them to ecompas more as instructors/explorers rather than
students and hence help them perceive well information and the usage of a new teaching
method in class.
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