101 Activities For Teaching Creativity And Problem Solving

Related Activities

• Exaggerate That [39]


• Law Breaker [50]

Procedure

1. Distribute the Turn Around Handout, review it with the participants, and answer
   any questions they may have.


2. Instruct the groups to state their problems simply and clearly and write them on a
   flip chart for all to see.


3. Tell them to list all assumptions about their problems on a flip chart. Remind them
   that even very obvious assumptions might be valuable.


4. Tell them to reverse each assumption in any way possible (as done in the hand-
   out) and write each one down on flip-chart paper.


5. Tell them to use each assumption as a trigger for new ideas, write each idea on a
   Post-it®Note, and place them on flip-chart paper for evaluation.

Debrief/Discussion

Some problem assumptions are extremely basic and fundamental; others may be more

abstract and esoteric. For instance, a basic assumption of a problem involving attracting

new bank customers would be that the customers have money to invest. A more abstract

assumption might be that customers put their money in banks primarily to satisfy their

needs for security. Either type of assumption is appropriate for this exercise. So encourage

participants to consider whatever assumption they think of, even if it may not be correct

technically.

Also consider having participants debrief using the following questions:

• What was most helpful about this exercise?


• What was most challenging?


• What can we apply?


• How would you rate the value of this exercise to helping us with this issue?


• Will this exercise be helpful in the future for other sessions?


• What did you learn?


• What will we be able to use from this exercise?


• What ideas were generated, and which ones were most interesting?

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