This collection of resources will support you as you work through the steps in the Activity Packet this week.

Have you come across other useful articles, tips and tools you would like to shsare related to the course content? Add them to the Open Forum and we (your facilitators) will maintain this resource page.


Step 1 Resources

  • Watch this short video [3:56] for a brief overview of the Design Thinking Process:

  • To get a sense of the connection between “empathy” and “define” (or perspective-taking for reframing problems) skim this Psychology Today article: “The Power of Perspective Taking” 

  • How Reframing A Problem Unlocks Innovation is a pivotal article for the week. It outlines the power of reframing by shifting our perspective. It also highlights the power of asking “Why?”

  • For further inspiration to help you with your introductions activity, skim Beth's short blog post about The inquiry activity of close-looking


Step 2 Resources

  • Read the article, Perception: Definition, Importance, Factors, Perceptual Process, Errors. It talks about factors that affect our perception, including physical and cognitive influences.

  • Skim over Your Lying Mind: The Cognitive Biases Tricking Your Brain. It's packed with interesting information, including research findings from experts, but it's a fairly long read. Directly relevant to this course, do a search through the article for "confirmation bias", a mental predisposition to essentially see what we want to see!

  • And, if you have time, watch this TED talk with Dan Ariely. Dan uses humour and visual examples to help us understand that we are sometimes limited in our cognitive decisions.


Step 3 Resources

  • No specific resources for this step. You are invited to share additional resources and/or questions in the Open Forum as needed.


Step 4 Resources

  • The article, Techniques for Empathy Interviews in Design Thinking, includes some great tips for conducting empathy interviews. (It is specific to designing a product for a set of customers, but the principles apply to empathy interviewing in general.)

  • The design thinking method called The Five Whys is a brief overview of an empathy interview tool.


Step 5 Resources


Last modified: Tuesday, 10 August 2021, 12:08 PM