The Hong Kong Science Fair, organised by the Hong Kong Innovation Foundation, is a competition that encourages students to develop innovative and human-centric solutions to real-life challenges, and learn how to improve and express their own ideas by applying their knowledge of science, technology and design to building hardware prototypes.
To get the process started, the MIT Hong Kong Innovation Node hosted an online Design Thinking Webinar specially tailored for the Hong Kong Science Fair with over 150 teachers and students attending from primary and secondary schools across Hong Kong. Throughout the 90-minute webinar, students and teachers learnt the fundamentals of Design Thinking (Empathy, Define, Ideate, Prototype, Test) and were given examples of real-world applications of design thinking to tackle important issues. For example, a fun basketball themed recycling bin design to encourage people to recycle more and ultimately reduce environmental pollution. Despite it being online, the session featured interactive elements, including polling and Q&A, to get students thinking and ensuring they understood the content.
The sessions helped equip teachers with the necessary knowledge to guide students with their submissions for the Hong Kong Science Fair, and empowered students to think out of the box and develop innovative creations with the application of design, science and technology.
Check out http://hksciencefair.org.hk for more information.