Brainstorming with Eureka

Unlocking creative ideas and innovations

Brainstorming is an important skill for generating creative and innovative ideas to solve complex problems, especially in impact learning and challenge-based learning. Brainstorm sessions help teams to take a complex problem or question and break it down into a simple narrative, idea or solution.

Brainstorming involves two core phases: (1) ideation and (2) narrowing down. During the ideation phase, participants generate as many ideas as possible without judgment or analysis. This encourages creative and unconventional thinking. During the narrowing down phase, the team evaluates and selects the most promising ideas, refining and developing them into a workable solution.

By mastering brainstorming, students can improve their critical thinking, problem-solving, and teamwork abilities, leading to success in any field and a positive impact on society.

Learning outcome

The student is able to apply creative thinking techniques to generate and develop original ideas and innovations

Using brainstorming rules and Eureka cards to generate and develop innovative ideas through a collaborative, non-judgmental approach.

1.Define Activity

15 mins

Welcome all students and provide an overview of the session’s goal, emphasising the main question or problem that the group will be brainstorming.

Tip: by establishing clear guidelines and expectations for brainstorming, you can help ensure a productive and collaborative session.

2.Ideate

15 mins

Instruct students to spend one minute generating ideas and writing them on individual blank A5 cards, with one idea per card. After the minute is up, every student passes the cards to the person on their right, who will contribute their own idea and further develop the existing idea on the card. Keep passing the cards around until all students have contributed to each card. This process typically takes around 10 minutes and can be repeated as needed to generate a variety of ideas.

If students encounter a creative block, they can draw an Eureka card. Encourage them to take a minute to read and reflect before continuing with idea generation. If they still struggle, they can move on to the next Eureka card until they come up with a new idea. Even if students don’t face any blocks during the brainstorming session, the Eureka cards can be used to foster creativity.

By fostering collaborative work and building upon one another’s ideas, students can generate a diverse range of potential solutions for the given problem.

3.Narrow Down

20 mins

To narrow it down, present the following rules to the students:

Stay on topic and avoid tangents to ensure that the ideas generated are relevant to the problem at hand
One conversation at a time

Introduce the traffic light method. Students review and prioritise the A5 cards by individually marking them with a colour dot based on the provided table:

Once everyone has marked their preferences, the group reviews the ideas that have most green dots and discusses which one to choose as the main idea to develop further or how to combine ideas from different cards.

After reviewing, the students pitch their chosen idea.

4.Reflection

30 mins

Using the rules for brainstorming as guidelines, each student will answer the reflective questions individually first, followed by a peer-group reflection on the brainstorming process.

Afterwards, students will share their reflections within the group and provide each other with feedback on the process.

Please note, as part of the assessment as learning, students reflect using the reflective questions.

5.Sharing

15 mins

The activity can be conducted in a circle involving all the teams, where each team pitches their final selection of ideas. Additionally, each team will reflect on their brainstorming process and provide examples of how they applied the rules for brainstorming.

To assess creativity and creative thinking in brainstorming, students reflect on their own performance during the process and incorporate feedback from their teammates. They will evaluate their transition from the beginning to the end of the process and check if they followed the brainstorming rules presented by the teacher. This reflection, along with constructive peer feedback, will be incorporated into Step 4 of the activity.

Purpose

Assessment as learning aims to strengthen the learning process and the development of metacognitive skills. It empowers students to direct their own learning and to become independent, critical self-assessors.

Roles

Self-reflection

Characteristics

Self-regulated learning

Materials

Reflective questions

Download Reflective questions

Rules for brainstorming and examples of brainstorming questions (Step 1) can be downloaded below.

Eureka cards (Step 2) are designed to encourage creativity and help students when they feel stuck in the process. The cards can provide prompts or suggestions to help spark new ideas and break through mental blocks. By incorporating Eureka cards into the brainstorming process, students can feel supported and empowered to think creatively and develop innovative solutions to the problem at hand.

Download Rules for Brainstorming

Download Eureka cards

Barbot, B., Besançon, M., & I Lubart, T. (2011). Assessing creativity in the classroom. The open education journal, 4(1).

Eno, B. & Schmidt, P. (1975). Over One Hundred Worthwhile Dilemmas.

Gulish, S., Elfstrom, S. (2017). Using Story for Creativity. In: Creativity in the Classroom. Transgressions: Cultural Studies and Education. SensePublishers, Rotterdam.

On Creativity (2020), Harvard Business Review, Harvard Business Review Press

Wilson C. (2013), Brainstorming and Beyond, A User Centred Design Method, (Morgan Kaufmann)(1st Edition).