Draw with your daughters: The Inventor’s Worksheet

The Inventor’s Worksheet combines drawing, design, and a little expository persuasion to encourage your kids to think like inventors—so that one day they might have the courage to take that first step to create the world in which they wish to live.

The Inventor’s Worksheet

Step 1: Download the Inventor’s Worksheet

Step 2: Print out a pile of copies and then dream up new inventions with your kids over breakfast, while waiting for the dentist, in that perfect 20 minutes after diner, or on those too hot or too rainy afternoons.

Step 3: Ask questions with enthusiasm, candor and curiosity. Help them build upon their own ideas to discover new go further ideas. Quote to them John Maeda’s favorite 日本語 phrase which translates roughly to “Above the up, there is more up.”

Step 4: Make sure your child signs her name as the inventor. Part of the learned comity & empathy comes from your child feeling a personal sense of stewardship over her idea and developing compassion for those for whom it was invented.

Step 5: Have a tremendous time. Don’t fuss over the quality of the drawing. Keep going. Make more. Non-sensical inventions, impossible physics, and poetic expression help unlock ideas. Say yes to creativity and celebrate ingenuity. Love your kids and draw with them every day.