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Nelly Kozyreva, TRIZ teacher,
nellydelf@rambler.ru
Elena Novitskaya, designer,
nov_ell@hotmail.com
The Altshuller-formulated principles of resolving
contradictions are the most popular TRIZ tool. How is it usually taught? The
explanation of the tool gist is normally accompanied by examples from various,
chiefly technical areas. A student must imagine the situation presented by a
teacher (which implies the knowledge of peculiarities of various constructions
from multiple branches of technology), “discern” the model of a problem and the
model of its solving with the aid of a principle. This demands a very high level
of abstract thinking of a student, the ability to focus on a topical problem and
to easily switch over to a next problem, as well as other special thinking
abilities which are not characteristic of all students.
How can we facilitate the understanding and mastering of a
principle by a student? It would be useful to ease his analytical apparatus of
comprehending a large number of example problems and to use the released efforts
in a more useful direction. For this purpose, a single through example is
very suitable. A student must focus on thorough understanding of an example only
once. Then he only adds new facts to the formed system of notions.
But how can we find such an example? A through example must
comply with some requirements:
-
It must be equally effective for illustrating the maximal
number of principles.
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The object used in the example must possess a potential for
unlimited transformations.
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The patent fund for the selected object must be rich
enough.
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The structure and the manner of operation of the object
must be easy to understand.
-
The example must be interesting for any category of
students.
Which objects have a lucid structure and are familiar to
everybody? Simple domestic appliances, simple toys, furniture, clothing and
footwear, books and stationery. Toys are most likely to be the kindly soil. The
main function of any toy is clear. It is to entertain. When toys and games are
employed in the teaching process, they always create a favorable feeling. At
TRIZ lessons, the matter of especial importance is to liberate consciousness, to
get rid of the blinders of standard thinking. The state of conventional return
to one’s childhood caused by a suggestion “let us play” hits off perfectly in
this situation. The toys that suit our purposes best of all are so-called
“motional” toys (whirligig, ball, and self-righting toy doll). Such toys are
usually based on some physical phenomenon or, sometimes, on some very simple
mechanical device. They are usually equally attractive both for children and for
adults. Among simple toys, the richest patent material is devoted to the
self-righting toy doll. The number of self-righting toy dolls of basically
different design is very large. One can select the most interesting solutions
from them.
The self-righting toy doll is known in multiple countries of
the world under different names, for instance «Vanka-Vstanka» in Russian, «Darum»
in Japan. The simplest self-righting toy doll is very easy to make: take a bar
of lightweight material (for instance, wood) with a spherical base and attach a
piece of lead to the base. The self-righting toy doll employs the principle of
stable balance: its center of gravity is always below the center of swinging,
that is why it is impossible to make such a doll «lie» without applying
additional force. It immediately bobs up, takes a vertical position and starts
swinging amusingly.
Fifty versions of a self-righting toy dolls were selected
from the patent collection. In those patents, the dolls, while swinging, “draw”
different geometrical figures, lie sidelong and stand on their heads, stretch
their necks, bob their heads and flourish their arms, gleam, chirp and wink. In
short, they do a lot of different amusing things.
(Fig. 1)
The analysis of the selected designs proved that the greatest
number of patents fall on 10 inventive principles out of 40: segmentation,
dynamization, spheroidicity, «matreshka» (nested doll), replacement of
mechanical scheme, «a contrario» principle, asymmetry, change of color, pneumo-
and hydroconstructions, change of physical and chemical parameters. This fact
corresponds to the recent tendency to range examples by frequency of use (Assessing
The Accuracy Of The Contradiction Matrix For Recent Mechanical Inventions
By: Darrell Mann); the list of 13 most frequently used principles by Nikolay
Khomenko; the teaching game «How to Solve a Problem» by Gorovits method. For the
initial stage of training, it is quite enough to introduce students to 10
principles.
Each principle and subprinciple is illustrated by several
self-righting toy dolls. On the other hand, different elements of one and the
same doll can illustrate several principles.
How is a lesson organized at which the principles are studied
with the aid of self-righting toy dolls? A teacher shows pictures of the dolls
and the drawings of their internal structure. Students practice the introduced
principle by proposing new possibilities of its use for the same engineering
solutions and by drawing schemes of their ideas on separate cards. This is a
very important advantage of this method, because the principle is mastered by
practicing immediately after it is presented to students. In addition this is
done in a favorable atmosphere of free creative process and not in a stressful
situation of search for a solution to an engineering problem.
The students can compare their own ideas with those already
patented, and to evaluate them. The group has a patent collection for
self-righting toy dolls at their disposal, where each design is drawn on a
separate card. When an idea of a student coincides with a patented invention
which is unfamiliar to him, his self-rating grows and a new impetus to a new
search is given not only to him but also to all members of the group.
The practical use of the method gave an amazing and so far
unexplainable result: each student, to whom some ten self-righting toy dolls
were shown and the principles used for their creation were explained, starts
inventing new dolls! Not infrequently the ideas proposed by students are wittier
and more interesting than those of patented prototypes. The ideas of
self-righting toy dolls come in showers. This occurs irrespective of age, sphere
of interest, profession and engineering background of students.
For in-depth mastering of the principle, students are given a
new task - to find a possibility to use the principle for improving technical
objects that are close to the self-righting toy doll (other toys). Then tasks
from more distant areas come - domestic appliances, pieces of furniture, car
mechanisms.
Even if the new skills of students are not used later on in
the technical sphere, they all the same do good. If a person is familiar with
TRIZ, in particular with the principles, he can use them for solving social
problems of his family, children or collective, for removing or, even better,
for preventing conflicts.
After being introduced to a series of principles, the group
may pass to the next TRIZ training stage - the study of the laws and trends of
engineering systems evolution.
For this purpose, a «map of laws» has been developed. The map
is a large-size table with stages and laws of systems evolution. After the
teacher has explained which laws of systems evolution were discovered, the
students fill «different storeys» of systems evolution stages with cards where
they write down all engineering solutions they know - both patents and their own
ideas. The students' cards are of different color, so it is possible to
immediately see who the author is. One can immediately see «white spots» on the
filled table. The students who mastered the initial skills in TRIZ wonder what
hinders them from filling those «white spots». Thus the mechanism of creative
search and intellectual competition is triggered again.
To make the method more apprehensible and popular, the
interactive game «Teach the Doll Bowing» is being developed. Besides Nelly
Kozyreva, who is the author of this method and the main ideologist of the
project, the team of developers includes Elena Novitskaya, designer, organizer
of the project and the author of the game structure and doll appearances;
Nikolay Shpakovsky, TRIZ consultant and project organizer; Andrey Mitasov,
programmer, doll-animator and author of the main game concept - «teaching
through teaching» (co-author of Tatyana Mitasova).
The game environment is a virtual school-studio, where dolls
are taught different bows and motions (at the moment, the game is designed for
East Asia region where a considerable accent is put on the culture of bowing).
(Fig.2)
A player performs the part of the doll trainer. At the
beginning of the game, he visits the pavilions and classrooms of the studio to
see how the already trained dolls (senior pupils) bow. The behavior of the dolls
can be controlled with the illusion of reality - they response adequately to the
cursor action. One may learn the structure of each doll in order to understand
its principle of operation.
(Fig. 3)
Then the new trainer himself gets down to work. The dolls may
be trained in accordance with the obtained orders (topical training) or in
accordance with one's creative desires. The main thing is to enjoy the process.
The beginners are ordinary dolls of a simple structure - a
head and a body with a displaced center of gravity. The trainer has to invent
and to assemble a doll so that its bows and motions are different from the known
ones, to endue the doll with a character, to work as a stylist - to choose
make-up, a hairdo, and a costume. For this purpose, there is a studio with a
huge depository of various products. All changes
are immediately reflected on the doll's behavior. The creative stages may be
saved so that one can go back to them again. The newly created dolls remain in
the classrooms and you can compare the ideas and to see which is better - yours
or patented samples.
The next level of the game introduces you to the laws of
engineering systems development by using the same example of self-righting toy
dolls. Besides, by studying the principle of operation of such dolls your child
will get acquainted with some physical phenomena.
The developed prototype of the game illustrates the basic
idea and some play possibilities, enables you to control the sample doll
behavior. The prototype contains 12 self-righting toy dolls that illustrate five
principles.
Appendix:
The game prototype in swf format.
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vankistudio1.swf (183 KB)
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