Thought exercise: Laser-Cut Puzzles

Challenge

Create a professional development exercise with a design thinking framework to get participants thinking outside of the box.

These laser-cut puzzles were designed for the Stanford Program in Writing and Rhetoric and the Hume Center for Writing and Speaking at Stanford University.

Solution

I designed and built the puzzles in Illustrator, had them cut out on a laser-cutting machine, and hand painted them. Then I asked a small sample group to beta test the puzzles by re-assembling them with basic instructions. From that, we were able to refine our exercise. On the day of our presentation, lectures were asked to work in groups to assemble the puzzles, each group had a varying set of instructions to follow. This led to an people making various assumptions about how to assemble the puzzles correctly. The results were overwhelmingly positive and surprisingly impassioned.

Lecturers clearly connected the challenging exercise they were being asked to do to the challenging assignments they were asking students to do. This nicely framed a day-long discussion about designing curriculum, clearly communicating with students, and making assumptions about what students know. Later, lecturers even borrowed the exercise to use in their own classrooms to help re-frame students’ thinking. The takeaway was that there is great value in thinking differently about a problem, or viewing a problem from a fresh perspective. I try to bring the spirit of this exercise to all my work.