Design Thinking and Identifying a Problem Have you ever been in a checkout line at a store and wondered if it could go faster There are reasons the line is slow Sometimes there are many people ahead of you Or maybe one person has an overflowing cart Maybe the cashier can’t go any faster because of the way something is arranged or constructed If you think about things like this you are thinking about design Many decisions go into the designs of everything you do including services like checkout lines banks restaurants and stores Design thinking is a special way to consider problems that have multiple solutions It is not like a math problem where 2 2 will always equal 4 When you have to think about all the possible solutions for one issue you have a design problem to solve Instead of asking why about something you are asking how as in How can I make it better In this book we will apply the design thinking process to improve something that many students your age experience every day a school lunch line In each chapter we’ll explore a step in the process so that you can design a better lunch line 4 CHAPTER ONE
Coming in one door grabbing food and going out another door is a common lunch line process What similarities does this line share with your cafeteria lunch line 5
Try This Think about the different steps in the lunch line process What is the first thing you or your friends grab to eat What is the last thing you get before going to your seat When or how do you interact with the adult lunch workers You might even think of where different stations are and how they are set up Now list different problems you might have whether it relates to distance efficiency or confusion about instructions for a new student Try to come up with as many problems as possible 6
Two windows and two lines allow twice the number of students to be served at one time The fruit and optional food can be accessed from both sides 7
