About the Activity Book

Did you know that the Idea Emporium was my thesis project? A book about thinking out of the box to blast through stuck thinking was an out of the box Capstone thesis project for my Master's of Science degree in Learning Tech/Instructional Design at Drexel University. I can only imagine how crazy my professor thought I was when I proposed the idea. My research focused on design education and e-learning as design was my background and I had an online school for ten years. What that research uncovered was a time in children's lives when their creative thinking, problem solving and free self-expression in their art and writing hit a snag. It had a name -- the U-shaped Decline -- and it was a developmental stage around 9 to 11. I posed a question. What if there was an antidote? Could imaginative design activities address those gaps and replenish lost skills? I held a focus group consisting of adults and children in that age group. What I discovered was interesting -- the children jumped in with enthusiasm and had no problem engaging their imagination. It was the adults that benefitted the most and had many stories of losing that free creative abandon as children around that crucial stage, yet, playing in the Idea Emporium reconnected them to that missing inner child ready to come out and play. 

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The activity book series focuses on thinking like a designer and will cover the Nursery (drawing to describe), the Bakery (stretching the Imagination with Color), the Fashion department (work within limitations), Toys (see with a new perspective), and the Invention Room ( testing out ideas).

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The book is now making the rounds in submissions.