“The real measure of success is the number of experiments that can be crowded into twenty-four hours.” ~ Thomas Edison
This article reflects on creativity, prototyping, and experience as key drivers of meaningful learning and design.
Creativity is often misunderstood as a talent reserved for a select few rather than a skill developed through practice, persistence, and experience. In Creative Confidence, Kelley and Kelley (2013) challenge this misconception by arguing that creativity grows through action. They emphasize that confidence is not built by avoiding failure, but by engaging in repeated attempts, reflection, and refinement. This perspective reframes learning as an active process, one that values growth over immediate success and progress over perfection.
This emphasis on action closely aligns with the role of prototyping described in Designing Interactions. Prototypes are not final products but early representations that allow designers to explore how an experience might function in real-world contexts (Moggridge, 2007). Whether created as sketches, models, or simulations, these representations help uncover opportunities, constraints, and unexpected outcomes early in the design process. By testing ideas before they are complete, designers gain insights that cannot be achieved through planning alone.
Parrish (2006) extends this idea by framing design as a form of storytelling, where learning unfolds through experiences rather than instructions. Design stories encourage designers to imagine how learners interact with an experience over time, including moments of confusion, discovery, and reflection. This narrative approach reinforces the idea that effective learning environments are dynamic and responsive, shaped by how learners engage with them rather than how content is delivered.
Together, these readings highlight a shared principle: meaningful learning emerges through doing. Whether through building creative confidence, testing ideas through prototypes, or envisioning learning as an unfolding story, all three authors emphasize engagement, iteration, and human experience. As I begin developing my instructional artifact, these ideas are shaping my approach, encouraging me to design learning experiences that prioritize movement, observation, and reflection, and that allow understanding to develop through interaction with real environments and ideas.
References:
Kelley, T., & Kelley, D. (2013). Creative confidence: Unleashing the creative potential within us all. Currency.
Moggridge, B. (2007). Designing interactions. MIT Press. (Chapter 11, “Prototypes,” pp. 682–755)
Parrish, P. (2006). Design as storytelling. TechTrends, 50(4), 72–82
