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IntroductionIn two studies we conducted, untutored Grade 7 students produced solutions to a design-and-make task in ways significantly different than ones prescribed by many textbooks and theories about learning to design. We found that novice designers (a) sequence the subprocesses of designing quite differently than the prescribed models, (b) do not generate several possible solutions and choose the most effective, (c) make greater use of three-dimensional modeling, (d) use less two-dimensional modeling than suggested by textbooks, and (e) constantly evaluate their design proposal from the earliest moments of the design-and-make process.The first study addressed the question: What design processes do Grade 7 students who have received no prior instruction use to produce a solution to a design-and-make task? Since the strategies used by these students may have been a function of the particular task and the way it was presented, a follow-up study addressed the question: Is the design process used by novices dependent on the task? This second study provided an opportunity to further investigate protocol analysis as a method for understanding novice designers' strategies. It also resulted in the refinement of a coding scheme to describe design process skills.This article first describes the theoretical framework used for the two studies and reviews related literature. Next, the methods used to collect and analyze the data are described. This is followed by a discussion of the strategies used by students and how the strategies differ from those in theoretical models of the design process. The implications of these findings for the teaching of design and technology complete the article.