Starting DI2017 Team for Rising Stars

Last week I met with 8 other parents who had kids interested in the Destination Imagination Program. In the past 3 years, I had volunteered for DI when my daughter was on DI programs. Now my son is very interested in DI. And this year almost I am forming a team. Over the past 3 years I had learnt to like DI a lot, since it enables the kids to bring out their creativity in a semi-structured and team setting. The kids develop skills in Collaboration, Creativity, and Communication.

The PTA at Medina Elementary has a very good organization to facilitate students to form DI Teams. Each parent has to register their child at http://medinapta.org/Page/StudentPrograms/DestinationImagination. Each school or region can form teams that get registered at the central DI organization. for 2017-2018 year, we have our local regional tournament on March 3rd, 2018 at Bellevue High School. Competitive segments from 3rd grade to high school, will have teams selected to participate in the state wide tournament often held at Wenatchee, WA, followed by the grand international tournament held at Knoxville, TN in late May 2018.

Last week we met first at the Bellevue Public Library which was a neutral and easy place to meet. However it is difficult to get library reservations on a regular basis. So we will switch to meeting at my house for now. There are five 2nd graders on the team along with Manu, this year. I look forward to a creative, challenging, and fun times together.

The DI organization shares materials for us to use to prepare for the DI challenges. The materials are provided to the team manager once the team is registered. The preparation materials include: quick start guide, roadmap, and challenge details. Fundamental to everything is for the team to organize itself for strength, sharing, learning, creating, and presenting the results for the challenge provided.

The teams can and will use Instant Challenges (IC) as the primary way to quickly think on their feet and come up with presentation or task based challenges. Often limited to 5-10 minutes, these IC spur amazing creativity with provided materials and team collaboration. Think of these challenges as a mini version of life challenges themselves. A strong team often has a methodical approach to tackle the problem and present novel solutions clearly.

The main challenge, also known as the Central Challenge (CC) is what the teams take time to prepare during the entire season. The teams are expected to read the challenges, internalize the same, come up with creative solutions and solve problems. They will likely develop solutions over many weeks often accompanied with a story to go with the solution.

Needless to say there is a lot of reading for the team managers and the children in the team. An important tenet of DI is to have no interference from the parents or outside members other than the team itself.

For me, we will first start with focus on teamwork. Our philosophy isthat strong team will create and shape good ideas as well as solve challenges. Rising stars challenge level allows us to explore how the kids form a team and work together with limited pressure as there is no competition. And instant challenges offer quick and easy way to help the kids form teams, listen and talk to each other, and appreciate each others’ strengths.

Our current team has a good set of 2nd graders and parents who are willing to help. I also have a co-team manager. I look forward to the year of learning and contributing to Manu’s team.