“Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Design is about knowing which ones to keep.” Scott Adams – game designer
At Millbrook School, we encourage children to develop their practical skills alongside an understanding of the aesthetic, social and environmental aspects of design. We aim for our children to become independent, creative and evaluative problem-solvers as individuals, and as part of a team in order to prepare them to contribute effectively in an increasingly technological world.
We encourage children to solve design problems; by carefully identifying needs and opportunities, by innovating a range of ideas, by experimenting with tools and techniques and by making and evaluating a range of products. Children are taught to evaluate their solutions at each stage of the design process in order to develop and refine their ideas and solutions further, this in turn also helps to promote resilience and encourage perseverance.
Through the historical study of design and technology, we ensure children learn about the contributions of famous designers and study previous design solutions. This allows them to reflect upon and evaluate past design solutions, their uses, their impacts and their influence on the present or subsequent designs.
We believe that design and technology should share links with other subjects such as maths, science and English and assist in the understanding and contextualising of learned skills. There will also be occasions when pupils are encouraged to draw on knowledge and skills acquired in other subjects, for instance, history, geography and art.