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Curious about coding? Want to build your programming skills? Or perhaps you just love a good problem-solving challenge?

We’re thrilled to announce our new 10-episode series: Think Like A Coder. The series, in partnership with YouTube Learning Playlists, will challenge viewers with programming puzzles as the main characters— a girl and her robot companion— attempt to save a world that has been plunged into turmoil.

Check out the series here:

In our digital age, coding has become a basic literacy skill which gives us a deeper understanding of the technology we use everyday. Beyond being a much sought-after skill on the job market, coding helps foster creativity, reinforces math skills and develops our problem-solving abilities.

But it can be hard to know where to begin. Learning to code is like learning a language and getting started can seem like a daunting task.  Luckily, if you have the right resources, the hardest part is just taking the first step. We’ve got you covered.

Think Like A Coder is joining the long list of free online resources for the code-curious. Here’s a list of some of our favorite learn-to-code resources:

1. code.org has great resources for students and teachers. It teaches students the basics of programming through a free series of guided exercises and includes an extensive curriculum mapped to K-12 curriculum standards.

2. If you’re looking for programming challenges, check out the Advent of Code, which is run by Eric Wastl, who consulted extensively on Think Like a Coder and inspired quite a few of the puzzles. The Advent of Code is a yearly event that takes place in December and involves 25 coding challenges linked together by an overarching plot. It’s also available throughout the rest of the year, and the challenges it features are a great way to stretch your coding and problem-solving skills once you have basic proficiency with a programming language.

3. FreeCodeCamp has thousands of coding lessons and programming challenges, and you can even get certified for a few different skills.

 4. University of Michigan’s Python for Everybody Specialization on Coursera is a beginner-level intro to software development using python that focuses on interacting with data.

 5. Microsoft has a 44 video series called Python for Beginners. In their words, “Even though we won’t cover everything there is to know about Python in the course, we want to make sure we give you the foundation on programming in Python, starting from common everyday code and scenarios. At the end of the course, you’ll be able to go and learn on your own, for example with docs, tutorials, or books.”

6. If you’re trying to decide what programming language to learn, a flowchart like this one may be a helpful starting point.

7. Girls Who Code: Learn to Code and Change the World by Reshma Saujani, founder of Girls Who Code, is an excellent introduction for programmers just getting started.

8. For more experienced programmers, Cracking the Coding Interview is a great resource for problem solving with a variety of different techniques, as well as preparing for coding interviews (as the title suggests). Some of the puzzles featured in Think Like a Coder were inspired by this book.

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Want to prevent yawns and glazed-over eyes? Before you deliver your next speech, pitch or address, learn how to create exceptional slides by following these rules (with real before-and-afters).

Slides are an expected and crucial part of most speeches, presentations, pitches and addresses. They can simplify complex information or messages, showcase relevant images, and help hold an audience’s attention. But quite often, the best slides aren’t those that make people sit up and comment on how good they are; instead, they’re the ones that people take in without really noticing because the content is effortlessly conveyed and matches the speaker’s words so well.

These days, showing high-quality slides is more important than ever. “We’re living in a visual culture,” says Paul Jurczynski, the cofounder of Improve Presentation and one of the people who works with TED speakers to overhaul their slides. “Everything is visual. Instagram is on fire, and you don’t often see bad images on there. The same trend has come to presentations.”

He says there is no “right” number of slides. However, it’s important that every single one shown — even the blank ones (more on those later) — be, as Jurczynski puts it, “connected with the story you’re telling.” Here, he shares 6 specific tips for creating the most effective slides. (Note: All of the examples below were taken from the actual slides of TED speakers.)

1. Do keep your slides simple and succinct

“The most common mistake I see is slides that are overcrowded. People tend to want to spell everything out and cover too much information,” says Jurczynski. Not only are these everything-but-the-kitchen-sink slides unattractive and amateurish, they also divert your audience’s attention away from what you’re saying. You want them to listen to the words that you slaved over, not get distracted by unscrambling a jam-packed slide.

“The golden rule is to have one claim or idea per slide. If you have more to say, put it on the next slide,” says Jurczynski. Another hallmark of a successful slide: The words and images are placed in a way that begins where the audience’s eyes naturally go and then follows their gaze. Use the position, size, shape and color of your visuals to make it clear what should come first, second and so on. “You don’t just control what the audience sees; you have to control how they see it,” says Jurczynski.

BEFORE: Too crowded

AFTER: Easy to absorb

2. Do choose colors and fonts with care

Colors and fonts are like the herbs and spices of your presentation. When used wisely and with intention, they’ll enhance your slides; but when tossed in haphazardly, they’ll make it an unappealing mess.

Let’s start with color. “Color is a key way to communicate visually and to evoke emotion,” says Jurczynski. “It can be a game changer.” Your impulse might be to pick your favorite hue and start from there, but he advises, “it’s important to use color with a purpose.” For example, if you’re giving a presentation about a positive topic, you’ll want to use bright, playful colors. But if you’re speaking about a serious subject such as gun violence or lung cancer, you’d probably go for darker or neutral colors.

While it’s fine to use a variety of colors in your presentation, overall you should adhere to a consistent color scheme, or palette. “The good news is you don’t need a degree in color theory to build a palette,” says Jurczynski. Check out one of the many free sites — such as Coolors or Color Hunt — that can help you assemble color schemes.

With fonts, settle on just one or two, and make sure they match the tone of your presentation. “You don’t have to stick to the fonts that you have in PowerPoint,” or whatever program you’re using, says Jurczynski. “People are now designing and sharing fonts that are easy to install in different programs. It’s been an amazing breakthrough.” Experiment. Try swapping a commonly used font like Arial for Lato or Bebas, two of many lesser known fonts available online. Most important: “Use a big enough font, which people often forget to do,” advises Jurczynski. Your text has to be both legible and large enough to read from the back of the room, he recommends — about 30 points or so.

BEFORE: Weak and hard-to-read font, muddy colors

AFTER: Strong font, color that’s striking but not jarring

3. Don’t settle for visual cliches

When you’re attempting to illustrate concepts, go beyond the first idea that comes to your mind. Why? The reason it appears so readily may be because it’s a cliché. For example, “a light bulb as a symbol for innovation has gotten really tired,” says Jurczynski. Other oft-used metaphors include a bull’s-eye target or shaking hands. After you’ve come up with your symbol or idea, he advises people to resist the lure of Google images (where there are too many low-quality and clichéd choices) and browse other free image sites such as Unsplash to find more unique visuals. One trick: If you do use stock, amp it up with a color overlay (as in the pic at the top of this article) or tweak it in some other way to counteract — or at least muffle — its stock-i-ness.

One potential source of pictures is much closer at hand. “If it fits the storyline, I encourage people to use their own images,” says Jurczynski. “Like one TED Talk where the speaker, a doctor, used photos of his experience treating people in Africa. That was all he needed. They were very powerful.” Major caveat: Any personal photos must support your speech or presentation. Do not squander your audience’s precious time by showing them a gratuitous picture of your children or grandparents — beautiful as they may be.

BEFORE: Fake-looking stock photo to illustrate teamwork

AFTER: Eye-catching photo of nature to illustrate teamwork

4. Don’t get bogged down by charts and graphs

Less is also more when it comes to data visualization. Keep any charts or graphs streamlined. When building them, ask yourself these questions:

What do I want the audience to take away from my infographic?

Why is it important for them to know this?

How does it tie into my overall story or message?

You may need to highlight key numbers or data points by using color, bolding, enlarging or some other visual treatment that makes them pop.

Maps are another commonly used infographic. Again, exercise restraint and use them only if they enhance your talk. “Sometimes, people put a map because they don’t know what else to show,” says Jurczynski. He suggests employing labels, color schemes or highlighting to direct your audience where to look. He adds, if you have the skill or know an artist, “you may even consider a hand-drawn map.”

BEFORE: Yikes! What’s important?!?

AFTER: The takeaway is clear

5.Don’t be scared of blank slides

It may seem counterintuitive, but at certain points in your speech or pitch, the best visual is … no visual at all. “At the beginning, I was not a fan of blank slides,” says Jurczynski. “But the more talks I’ve seen, the more a fan I am of them, because sometimes you want all the attention on yourself and you don’t want people distracted by what they see in the slides. Or, you might use them to give the audience a visual break from a series of slides. Or maybe you want to shift the mood or tempo of the presentation.”

The blank slide is the visual equivalent of a pause, and most stories could use at least one. And with blank slides, Jurczynski has one main “don’t”: “You cannot use white blank slides, because if you do, people will see it and think something is broken.”

6. Do remember to practice

The easiest way to figure out if your slides really work? Recruit a colleague, friend or family member, and run through your entire presentation with them. Sometimes, people can get so carried away with rehearsing their delivery and memorizing their words that they forget to make sure their slides complement and synch up with what they’re saying.

“Even if you have the best visuals in the world, you need to practice in front of someone else. Once you start practicing, you may see, ‘I’m talking about a sad story, but on the slide behind me, I have something funny and that doesn’t make sense,’” says Jurczynski. “Or, ‘Oh, this could be a good place for a blank slide.’”

Bright, vivid color really does give us more energy — and that’s just one of the things designer Ingrid Fetell Lee discovered in her 10-year search for the sources of joy.

Few people would name their favorite color as gray or beige, yet our closets and our homes are often filled with these bland, neutral tones. When I studied color and its effect on joy, I wondered: Why is there such a gap between the colors that enliven us, and the colors that surround us?

“Chromophobia,” was the immediate answer I received when I posed this question to Peter Stamberg and Paul Aferiat, architects of the technicolor Saguaro Hotel in Palm Springs, California, which credits its electric hues with making it the third most Instagrammed hotel in the world.

Why are people scared of color? “It’s the fear of making a choice,” said an architect. “Of making a mistake and having to live with it.”

“People are afraid of color,” Stamberg told me. He was clearly referring to people other than himself and Aferiat, who live in a temple to vibrancy. Their open New York City loft was divided not with walls but with colors — panels of yellow, green, blue and orange. The two sat perched on a violet sofa, next to a pair of vermillion chairs, a pink rug underfoot.

“It’s the fear of making a choice,” Aferiat said. “Of making a mistake and having to live with it.”

I could relate. I used to be a certified chromophobe, so afraid of color that the entire spectrum of my apartment fell between white and cream.

My sofa was ivory; my bookshelves off-white. My bed linens, towels and curtains were all crisp, clean white. In the corner of my bedroom I piled my clothes on a director’s chair covered with — you guessed it — white canvas. Whenever I needed a new piece of furniture I browsed colorful catalogs, ogling mustard velvet sofas and pink-striped slipper chairs. But in the end, I always came home with trusty old white.

Then one day I moved into my dream apartment: a railroad layout on the top floor of a brownstone, with wood floors, windows overlooking a green yard and a small skylight. The only problem — the walls were a buttery yellow. From the moment I first saw the space, I fantasized about repainting it.

But something funny happened. Each day I’d come home to that apartment, it felt like the sun was shining, even in the dead of winter. When I returned from a trip, I felt overjoyed to be there — every single time. I ended up living there for six years, and after the first week I never again thought about repainting.

From the moment I began studying joy, it was clear that the liveliest places and things all had one thing in common: bright, vivid color.

Why are there so many chromophobes out there? I think it’s because there’s a cultural bias against color. We’ve come to dismiss color and joy as childish and frivolous, prizing neutral hues as a mark of coolness and mature taste. That belief has left us in a place where we feel almost ashamed to have color in our lives.

I’ve spent the last decade studying joy. From the beginning, it was clear that the liveliest places and things all had one thing in common: bright, vivid color. Whether it’s a row of houses painted in bold swathes of candy hues or a display of colored markers in a stationery shop, vibrant color sparks a feeling of delight.

The human eye is adept at distinguishing between subtly different colors; scientists estimate we can see as many as seven million distinct shades. As it turns out, our color vision is an integral sense that relates directly to our survival. Our distant ancestors were nocturnal animals who had little use for color vision. They foraged under cover of darkness, relying more on smell than on sight. But some 25 million years ago, brazen night monkeys ventured out into the daylight, adopting the diurnal schedule that we still follow today.

The ability to see color suddenly became a useful advantage. While the eyes of their nocturnal cousins had two types of color-sensing cone cells, our ancestors evolved a third cone that was sensitive to light in the middle of the spectrum, radically multiplying the number of colors they could see. This extra cone revealed to them a tantalizing array of new shades, including the ability to distinguish red from green.

While we think of color as an attribute, really it’s a happening: a constantly occurring dance between light and matter.

Scientists believe this particular development was of critical importance because it allowed our ancestors to identify sugar-rich ripe fruits and nutritious young leaves in the dense treetops where they lived. (Young leaves are often red because they contain anthocyanin pigments that haven’t yet been masked by chlorophyll.) Research suggests color vision provided such an advantage that our ancestors’ brains evolved a reduced capacity for processing smells to allow for an increase in handling visual information.

While we think of color as an attribute, really it’s a happening: a constantly occurring dance between light and matter. When a beam of light strikes an object, let’s say a multicolored glass vase, it is pelting its surface with tiny energetic particles called photons. The energy of some photons is absorbed, heating the glass imperceptibly. But other photons are repelled, ricocheting back out into the atmosphere.

These photons, landing on our retinas, create the sensation of color. The specific hue we see has to do with the energy of the photons — high-energy, short wavelengths look blue to us, while low-energy, long ones appear red. The brightest pigments tend to have a more “excitable” molecular structure. Their electrons can be disturbed with very little light, making their colors appear intense to our eyes.

If you’d like a more energized space, the best first step is to lighten the room’s largest surfaces: walls, floors, cabinets and counters.

Ultimately, creating colors that enliven us is about increasing the activity of these vibrating little particles in a space. Bright colors animate the light that shines on them, reflecting it around a space and magnifying its effect. Yellow is especially effective as a brightening agent. Because it’s the lightest of all the hues in its pure state, it has an inherent brightness and warmth.

So if you’d like a more energized space, experts agree the best first step is to lighten the room’s largest surfaces: walls, floors, cabinets and counters. Dark walls may look sophisticated, but because they absorb light, they’re going to reduce the light bouncing around the room. Many designers prefer to start with white walls, bringing color into the space through furniture and decorative objects. But even smaller pops of pure color can reflect enough light to energize a dingy room. This approach of using tiny bursts of bright color can be an appealing strategy for chromophobes — I can personally attest to it — and it’s surprisingly effective.

According to designers, the best pigments for creating light are fluorescent colors. They absorb photons at higher-energy wavelengths that lie in the invisible ultraviolet range and reflect them back at visible wavelengths. The day-glo colors found on traffic cones and tennis balls imbue surfaces with a intensely upbeat vibe, but a little goes a long way.

Artist Henri Matisse’s light, bright palette is an ideal choice for color inspiration.

In my experience, it takes a little practice to become confident with color, especially when it comes to putting different ones together. But here’s a clever shortcut for finding joyful combinations. Once, when Stamberg and Aferiat were stuck on choosing a color for a house they were designing, they turned to a good friend, painter David Hockney. He said, “Do what I do whenever I have a color problem. Look at Matisse.”

Not only did the vibrant paintings of Henri Matisse inspire them to choose the right blue, but they also began to use this approach with clients. When people see bold colors coexisting amiably on a canvas, it gives them confidence that they will also work in their homes. Matisse’s light, bright palette is an ideal choice for color inspiration, but other artists I often look at include Helen Frankenthaler, Sonia Delaunay, Pierre Bonnard and David Hockney.

For most of my life, I thought about my color choices through the lens of what they said about me. Did I have the guts to rock red shoes? Would a pink dress make people take me less seriously? Perhaps that’s why I so often ended up with white furniture and black clothes.

My research on the aesthetics of joy has liberated me to choose colors based not on what others think but on how the colors make me feel. Noticing color and light has changed the world around me. Bright hues have become little gifts for me — small infusions of warmth and life giving me the power to make my own hearth, my own sun.

Excerpted from the book Joyful: The Surprising Power of Extraordinary Things to Create Extraordinary Happiness by Ingrid Fetell Lee. Reprinted with permission from Little, Brown and Company, a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc. Copyright © 2018 by Ingrid Fetell Lee.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ingrid Fetell Lee is the founder of the blog The Aesthetics of Joy and was formerly design director at the global innovation firm IDEO. This piece was adapted for TED-Ed from this Ideas article.

Practice an act of radical empathy — try to put yourself in the hoofsteps, pawprints and undulations of other creatures and appreciate all the ways of being and doing that exist on this planet.

We are not alone. On Earth, that is. While it may seem laughably obvious to say that, in many ways we humans act like we’re the only inhabitants. After all, our built world overwhelmingly prioritizes our one species above all the others that occupy the planet.

How often do most of us stop and consider how other living beings experience the world?

Almost never, says Alan Hook, a design researcher at Ulster University in Northern Ireland: “We understand the world from a very fixed human-centric point of view … so [we] can’t really understand what it must be like to be a different creature.”

Meet some human designers who are breaking down the barriers. In Ireland, Denis Connolly and Anne Cleary have created a series of meta-perceptual helmets that allowed wearers to view the world through the stereo vision of a hammerhead shark or the separately rotatable eyes of the chameleon. To get as close to being a goat as possible, UK designer Thomas Thwaites (TED talk: How I built a toaster from scratch) built himself a prosthetic goat legs and a prosthetic rumen (goat stomach) and took to the Swiss Alps to graze on grass.

Hook says, “Whenever we think about design, we talk about it as a process of empathy.” Trying to step into the hoofsteps, pawprints, undulations and tracks of other creatures can allow us to consider how the world — including our human world — appears to them.

Hook became interested in this question thanks to a horse that lives near his house. His two children, he says, were “very concerned about whether the horse is too hot or too cold, whether it has enough to eat, and what the experience of the horse is like.” This prompted him to devise what he calls “equine eyes,” a way for his kids to interact with the world from a horse’s point of view, which differs from ours in significant ways.

Hook says, “They have their eyes on the side of their heads … and those large eyes work like fisheye lenses, which means that a horse can actually see 350 degrees around it. So it can see everywhere apart from its back.” Because horses cannot see red, Hook’s prototype eyes used cameras and programming to strip red from the visible spectrum.

Of course, you don’t need a fancy device to see from another perspective. Try this with the animals in your life — crouch down in the living room and assess it from your dog’s or cat’s point-of-view. Or look at the non-human residents who live in your neighborhood — the birds, insects, rodents, lizards and squirrels — and ask, What is life like from their eyes? How might it feel to move like they do? Eat like they do? Follow their routines? How much do they accommodate we humans as they go about their daily business?

It’s a refreshing mental break — and an exercise in empathy. While we can’t yet fully understand what it’s like to live in another body, we can start to notice the infinite ways of being and doing there are in our world.

Watch his TEDxBallybofey talk here:

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mary Halton is Assistant Ideas Editor at TED, and a science journalist based in the Pacific Northwest. This piece was adapted for TED-Ed from this Ideas article.

Brainstorming was invented in the 1930s as a practical idea-generation technique for regular use by “creatives” within the ad agency BBDO. The skill began to gain a wider audience in 1942, when Alex Osborn — the “O” in BBDO — released a book called How to Think Up and sparked the imaginations of his fellow Mad Men.

Since 1942, the method that began life in a New York creative firm has grown into the madness of Silicon Valley. Somewhere near Stanford, an introvert cringes every time the idea comes up of sitting in a roomful of colleagues, drawing half-baked ideas on Post-it notes, and then pasting them to the wall for all to see. (If this is you, watch David Kelley’s TED Talk on creative confidence, followed by Susan Cain’s on the power of introverts.)

I’ve run a lot of brainstorms over the years: with designers at IDEO, with Tom and David Kelley (I co-authored the book Creative Confidence with them), and with innovative educators at TED-Ed. I’ve come to believe that there’s no one right way to run a brainstorm. You have to be willing to modify the format, length and parameters of each session to match the mix of introverts, extroverts and creative confidence levels in the room.

Below, 9 tips on how to run a brainstorm:

1) Circulate the question or topic before you start. For introverts who generate ideas best without the looming presence of others, knowing the topic in advance is key. This allows them to come prepared with several creative options — and not feel stampeded by extroverts who prefer to riff.

2) Keep the following guidelines in a place everyone can see during the brainstorm: 1) One idea at a time, 2) Encourage wild ideas, 3) Build on the ideas of others, 4) Defer judgment (no criticism), 5) Stay on topic. The goal at this stage of the innovation cycle is to remix and add to others’ ideas — not filter or critique. Thus the default mode for a successful brainstorm is “Yes, and.” As in comedy improv, good brainstormers don’t waste time tearing down silly-sounding ideas. Instead, they either improve on the idea by adding something awesome to it, or generate a new idea quickly. Another way to phrase this is “build on the ideas of others.” This is one guideline I always mention at the beginning of every brainstorm, and reinforce throughout.

3) Seat the group at a round table (or in a circle). Hey, it worked for King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.

4) Start at your left and go around the circle. Each person gives one idea at a time. No one gets skipped over. This will help you hear from all members of the group — and not just the ones with the loudest voices.

5) Aim for a specific quantity of ideas. 25 ideas, say. Let the group know the goal at the start, and don’t stop until you get to that number.

6) Number the group list of ideas as it’s generated. Skip the Post-its and just use big pieces of paper on the table, or a blackboard if that’s what you have. The numbering part helps people feel especially accomplished as they go. A mental pat-on-the-back.

7) Write down every single idea that’s mentioned, and take a neutral, respectful stance toward each idea. Consciously or subconsciously, others will cue off your lead. You want everyone in the room to feel heard, to have permission to speak their piece, and to defer judgment during the brainstorm. Pro tip: don’t attach people’s names to ideas.

8) Keep each session short. 10 minutes at the end of class is fine. If 10 minutes is too hard to find, one successful alternative to an in-person group brainstorm is to tape a large piece of paper to a wall near the door, write your question at the top, and include a pen that people can use to anonymously write in their answers. Leave it up for 5 days, then take a picture and transcribe it.

9) Share back the unfiltered ideas list after the brainstorm ends. You never know which idea might spark something great.

Like other idea-generation tools, brainstorming was invented to make creative success easier — which is why creators are still using this technique 75+ years after its invention. To learn more about how to use design and innovation methods in education, I recommend these three options: take a course at IDEO U, download the Design Thinking for Educators Toolkit, or join the Teachers Guild.

Art credit: iStock

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Design thinking is both a mindset and a methodology. As a mindset, it’s about putting people at the center of your work. As a methodology, it’s about defining a problem, prototyping rapidly, and then implementing a human-centered design solution. This way of thinking can be used to solve problems, large and small — from designing a new hospital layout to minimize the spread of germs, to creating a new design for a spoon.

In the classroom, design thinking can provide a powerful platform for creative and innovative learning. One tool that can help you teach design thinking skills in a playful and creative way is littleBits. The colorful Bits snap together with magnets, making it a fast and easy way for students to learn how to solve a real-world challenge and invent with electronics.

For example, the Invent For Good Challenge, which focuses on empathy, challenges students to find a problem that’s affecting someone else and come up with a solution to solve it. Using the littleBits Invention Cycle, which draws inspiration from Stanford d. school’s design thinking process (identify a problem, brainstorm ideas to solve it, prototype a solution, test/play with it to see if it works, and learn from your findings to improve it), students are able to quickly invent solutions to address the problem that they’ve identified. Students go through the process, step-by-step, and document what they’re doing as they go along using the littleBits Invention Log. Sharing is also encouraged as an important part of the feedback process; you can view and comment on inventions from creators all around the world on the littleBits invention page. Three amazing examples: 8-year old João from Brazil invented a prosthetic arm, 11-year-old Anahit and her sister from California created a device to help the blind navigate, and middle-schooler Max from Ohio built a smart way to socialize cats.

What will students design, invent, and create in your classroom this year? Let’s find out!

To get more classroom inspiration delivered to your inbox, sign up for the TED-Ed weekly newsletter here >>

Art credit: littleBits

The innovation cycle (also called “design thinking” or “human-centered design” methodology) is a practical, repeatable way to create solutions to problems worth solving. In technology and design hubs like Silicon Valley, many successful startup founders incorporate innovation methods and mindsets into their company culture, and/or use a version of this innovation cycle during product development. Why? Because it works! And you don’t have to be an entrepreneur to use these tools. For educators, this creative problem-solving methodology can be equally effective when applied to everyday school, work and life challenges, too. Here are the steps of the innovation cycle, as defined for the TED-Ed Innovative Educator program:

1. Get inspired by real people to create a solution that meets one of their needs.
2. Brainstorm a list of ideas, solutions and creative ways to meet this need.
3. Choose one viable, feasible and desirable idea to develop within real world constraints. This is your innovation concept.
4. Make a tangible first model, prototype, experiment, rough draft, etc. of your innovation concept. Whatever you create should be a quick, cheap, low-risk way to test and refine your innovation concept.
5. Improve and advance your innovation concept over time based on relevant feedback from a small group. Iterate quickly, multiple times.
6. Launch or implement an early version of your innovation with a larger group. Continue to improve it based on feedback from the people using it. Do more of what works and less of what doesn’t.
7. Present your insights from this innovation cycle to a small group of colleagues, so that they can use and learn from what you’ve made.
8. Decide: Is this innovation successful? Is it an idea worth spreading? If so, share it with the world.

Right now, the first TED-Ed Innovative Educators are hard at work on their Innovation Projects — and we’ll be sharing their best solutions with you here on the TED-Ed Blog. But you don’t have to wait to start designing the future of education. The next time you find yourself faced with a challenge at your school, try the innovation cycle outlined above.

Want to learn more about how to use design and innovation methods in education? Take a course at IDEO U, download the Design Thinking for Educators Toolkit or join the Teachers Guild.

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