{"id":4401,"date":"2019-04-19T23:44:29","date_gmt":"2019-04-20T04:44:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stager.tv\/?p=4401"},"modified":"2021-07-29T12:50:23","modified_gmt":"2021-07-29T17:50:23","slug":"the-subtlety-of-prompt-setting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stager.tv\/?p=4401","title":{"rendered":"The Subtlety of Prompt Setting"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Invent to Learn<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In Chapter Four of our new book, Invent to Learn – Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom<\/a>, we discuss the importance of prompt setting as a basis for project-based learning. I argue that “a good prompt is worth 1,000 words.<\/em>” Projects are not the occasional dessert you get as a reward after consuming a semester’s worth of asparagus, but that the project should be a teacher’s “smallest unit of concern.<\/em>“<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last week, Sylvia Martinez<\/a> and I completed a successful four-city Texas Invent to Learn workshop tour. Each workshop featured an open-ended engineering challenge. This challenge, completed in under two hours, was designed not only to introduce making, engineering, tinkering, and programming to educators with diverse experience, but to model non-coercive, constructionist, project-based learning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Presented with what we hope was a good prompt, great materials, “sufficient” time, and a supportive culture, including a range of expertise, the assembled educators would be able to invent and learn in ways that exceeded their expectations. (We used two of our favorite materials: the Hummingbird Bit Robotics Kit<\/a> and Snap!<\/a> programming language.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A good time was had by all. Workshop participants created wondrous and whimsical inventions satisfying their interpretation of our prompt. In each workshop a great deal was accomplished and learned without any formal instruction or laborious design process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What’s your point?
<\/strong>Earlier today, our friends at Birdbrain Technologies<\/a>, manufacturers of the Hummingbird Bit Robotics Kit<\/a>, tweeted one of the project videos from our Austin workshop. (Workshop participants often proudly share their creations on social media, not unlike kids. Such sharing causes me to invent new workshop prompts on a regular basis so that they remain a surprise in subsequent events.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This lovely video was shared for all of the right reasons. It was viewed lots of times (and counting). Many educators liked or retweeted it, All good!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What’s slightly more problematic is the statement of the prompt inspiring this creation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Problem: The Easter Bunny is sick. Design a robot to deliver eggs.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

That was not<\/em> the exact prompt presented to our workshop participants. This slight difference makes all the difference in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The slide used to launch the invention process<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Aren’t you just nitpicking?
<\/strong>Why quarrel over such subtle differences in wording?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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