Are answers more important than questions? Planning an empathy design innovation course for young students

Abstract

This paper presents the planning of an innovation course for elementary school students. The course is designed and organized by the Beijing Normal University in collaboration with the China Soong Ching Ling Science and Culture Centre for Young People. This course aims to foster children's empathy and creative thinking. There are three core teaching phases: theme exploration, design expression, and prototyping. In addition, the research team applies NeuroDesign techniques (i.e., fNIRS) to quantitatively measure students' development of empathy and innovation to assess the effectiveness of teaching and learning. Educators would refer to this planning for designing other educational courses on fostering creativity.