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ime 5, No. 4
i

Published by the National Society of Professional Engineers

pri fOg3 Reprinted with permission from ENGINEERING TIMES

‘Glympics of the
Mind’—a Creative
Solution to a
Teaching Problem
Now Becoming

a National Craze

A ‘daVinci-Spring Car’

By Kathryn W. Hickerson
Staff Writer

Life is full of probiems that require
creative solutions, yet few people ever
receive ary formal preparation for
creative probiem solving.

To encourage the “fluency of
thinking” that leads to creative prab-
lent solving, two New Jersey educa-
tors started Olympics of the Mind
(OM), an organization devoted to
teaching young people ranging in age
from five to if the thrill ef devising
innovative solutions to tough prob-
lems.

“We want to teach an attitude to-
ward problem solving that will re-
main a lifelong asset,” says Sam
Micklus, one of OM's founders and a
professor in the Department of In-
dustrial Education and ‘technolo ry GU
New Jersey's Glassboro State College.

“We want to develop the capacity of
divergent thinking—as contrasted
with pure fact-gathering—that
comes from trying to salve problems
for which there could be more than
ane correct solution,” he says.

Will it holdt An Olympics of the Mind team tests its engracering shills by adding another eight
fo a structure constructed of Ye" x Ye" x 36" balsa wood and weighing only Ye ounce. The record
for a balsa-wood structure was a design by an Arkansas fugh schoul team that held 900 the before
collapsing.

“woe

The whole thing began several
years ago in Micktus’ classes, when he
found that the facts he taught his in-
dustrial arts students “often dida't
match the problems of the real
world? “To br ldge this gap, he created
problems for his students to solve.

One semester, he asked them to in-
venta device Costing less than $5, and
not using a paddle, a motor, ora sail,
to get them across a campus pond.
Some of the devices worked: some
didn't. Among those that passed the
test OF navigation was a design adap-
tation of a hamster exercise wheel
made from storm fencing and con-
struction plastic.

Another time, Micklus asked his
students to design a vehicle without
wheels to go around a course. Once,
his studeats were challenged to in.
vent a mechanical contrapiion that
would threw apie about six feet—
Straight at Micklus’ face. “Unforia
nately, some of those worked quite
well” he says. :

Conversations with ‘led Gow Iey of
the. New Jersey Departnent of Edu-
cation about the students’ problem-
solving successes led the two men to
sponsor a problenvsolving competi-
tion for elementary and secondiuy
studenis in New fersey in 1978,

‘Teams fom 28 schouls participated