Inquiring & Analyzing
Students explain and justify the need for a solution, identify and prioritize research, analyze existing products, and develop a design brief.
Curriculum · Grades 6–10 (MYP Years 1–5)
MYP Design
A five-year spiral curriculum in digital and combined design, built for a China-based international school, with AI integrated as a required design lens. The same core skills — inquiry, ideation, making, evaluation — are revisited each year at increasing depth, through recurring project archetypes students meet in ever more ambitious forms.
A Grade 6 student who makes a paper poster about a campus problem should, by Grade 10, be able to design, prototype, and evaluate a full interactive digital solution to that same kind of problem.
The four criteria
Criteria Key
Developing Ideas
Students develop a design specification, generate a range of feasible design ideas, present and justify their chosen design, and produce accurate planning drawings and diagrams.
Creating the Solution
Students plan, demonstrate technical skills, follow the plan to a functioning solution, and justify changes made along the way.
Evaluating
Students design testing methods, evaluate the solution against the specification, explain improvements, and assess impact on the client or audience.
IB requires every strand of every criterion to be assessed at least twice per year. Each year runs four two-month units: Units 1 and 3 carry A + B summative emphasis, Units 2 and 4 carry C + D — while every unit still touches all four criteria through a compressed design folder. Every strand is assessed four times per year, twice summatively.
Year at a glance
Five Years, Twenty Units
Required design lens
AI in Every Unit
Every unit in every grade treats AI as part of the contemporary designer's toolkit — woven through all 20 units, not bolted on as a separate topic. The posture is practical-first: ethics and critique are taught where they genuinely arise in the work. A student whose PSA script gets three bland AI drafts learns about AI limits in the moment, not in the abstract.
AI accelerates research — summarizing sources, generating comparison questions, suggesting products to analyze, exploring user personas. The skill students learn is verifying AI output against primary sources.
AI expands ideation — generating variations, alternative forms, reading design specifications for gaps, producing rapid concept sketches. The skill is not collapsing to the AI's first suggestion.
AI assists making — pair-programming, debugging, copy-editing, image variants, style transfer. The skill is reading AI output critically and documenting what is AI-generated vs student-made.
AI supports testing — heuristic evaluation, generating edge cases, simulating user feedback, comparing solutions against specifications. The skill is trusting real user data over AI-generated predictions.
Sophistication Progression
- Grade 6: AI as a clearer explainer. Students ask it to explain concepts, rephrase hard ideas, and suggest vocabulary. Prompt writing introduced as a design skill. Light touch.
- Grade 7: AI as an ideation partner. Students use it to generate 20 bad ideas so they can pick good directions. First structured comparison of student-generated vs AI-generated work.
- Grade 8: AI as a research accelerator and code helper. Students learn to verify every factual claim and to read AI-generated code critically. First encounter with AI hallucinations in a context where it matters.
- Grade 9: AI as a pair-designer. Code review, design critique, evaluation simulation, user interview question generation. Students learn to push back on AI when it's wrong.
- Grade 10: AI as a professional workflow component, integrated throughout. Students also examine AI as a designed system — bias, failure modes, and professional documentation standards for AI attribution.
Tools in China
Primary tools are strong Chinese AI models available without a VPN: DeepSeek, Kimi, Doubao, and Wenxin, with Doubao or Jimeng for light image generation. Western models (Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini) are enrichment for home use — never required for assessment, insulating the curriculum against access changes.
The AI Use Log
Every design folder ends with an AI Use Log: which tools, what was asked, what came back, and what the student kept, changed, or rejected — and why. Half a page in Grade 6, a professional cited-collaborator statement by Grade 10. Honest attribution, built-in reflection, and visible evidence that AI is taught critically. Templates per grade →
Five-year progression spine
Skills by Domain
| Domain | Gr 6 (Y1) | Gr 7 (Y2) | Gr 8 (Y3) | Gr 9–10 (Y4–5) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Visual / Graphic | Raster basics (Krita / Photopea). Posters, memes, basic layout. Color theory, typography intro. | Vector work (Inkscape). Logos, icons, infographics. Composition rules. | Brand systems. Style guides. Multi-asset consistency across formats. | UX/UI in Figma or Penpot. Interactive prototypes, user flows, visual hierarchy at production level. |
| Web / Code | Scratch logic. Intro to how a web page works (view-source). Block-based HTML editors. | Hand-written HTML + CSS (single-page sites). Basic responsive concepts. | HTML/CSS/JS. Python basics with JSONPlaceholder API. Multi-page sites. | Full web apps with JS frameworks or static generators. Data fetching, forms, mocked user accounts. API consumption. |
| Game / Interactive | Paper / card game design. Rules, balance, playtesting. | MakeCode Arcade — block-based game programming. | MakeCode Arcade in JavaScript mode, or Scratch → Python transition via games. | Unity, Godot, or web-based p5.js / Phaser games. Longer-form projects with full design docs. |
| Physical / Electronics | Cardboard and paper prototyping only. No hardware spend. | Cardboard mechanisms, simple linkages. Still no electronics. | micro:bit or Arduino Nano clone class kit. LEDs, buttons, sensors. First physical computing unit. | Gr 9: Arduino with servos, motor drivers, sensors. Gr 10: ESP32 / IoT, RC components, integrated digital+physical systems. |
| Video / Audio | Phone video + simple edit (CapCut or DaVinci Resolve intro). Basic storyboard. | DaVinci Resolve. Multi-track edit, titles, transitions, basic audio. | 2D frame-by-frame animation in Krita. Podcast / voiceover with Audacity. | Motion graphics (HitFilm Express or Blender VSE). Production-quality short-form video. |
| 3D / Spatial | — (introduced later) | Tinkercad (browser, free). | Tinkercad → Blender intro (low-poly modeling). | Blender: modeling, texturing, lighting. Architectural visualization or product rendering. |
| Design Process | Cycle introduced in plain language. Design journal is physical or a simple document. Heavy scaffolding. | Students identify the cycle phases themselves. Journal moves digital. | Students lead their own research plans. Formal design briefs. Peer critique introduced. | Student-driven inquiry; teacher is consultant. Full MYP-standard design folders as e-portfolio — begins to resemble DP Design Technology IA. |
Three Spiraling Archetypes
self-presentation
“Who I Am”
- Gr 6 — A4 personal identity poster (raster).
- Gr 7 — Personal logo + business card set (vector).
- Gr 8 — Static personal website, hand-written HTML + CSS.
- Gr 9 — Interactive portfolio prototype in Figma / Penpot.
- Gr 10 — Published portfolio site with case studies from all prior years: the capstone.
games / interaction
“Playable Thing”
- Gr 6 — Paper board game for a target audience.
- Gr 7 — Block-coded arcade game in MakeCode Arcade.
- Gr 8 — Physical computing game on micro:bit / Arduino.
- Gr 9 — Web or Unity game with playtesting data and iteration.
- Gr 10 — Interactive installation or connected-device game; physical + digital.
service-oriented design
“Campus Problem”
- Gr 6 — Wayfinding / signage solution.
- Gr 7 — Public service announcement video for a school issue.
- Gr 8 — Interactive info kiosk mockup or small physical device.
- Gr 9 — Sensor-based prototype addressing a measurable school problem.
- Gr 10 — Full integrated campus-system proposal: dashboard + sensor + stakeholder report.
Browse the curriculum
By Grade & Topic
MYP Year 1
Grade 6
Building the design vocabulary. Students learn what a design cycle is, practice every strand in a scaffolded way, and produce four small projects. No electronics this year — all software and paper-based.
Four units + strand coverage →MYP Year 2
Grade 7
Visual systems and multimedia. Students move from single artifacts to coordinated sets (a brand system, a video + thumbnail + promotional poster), deepen their code fluency in MakeCode Arcade, and start vector work and video editing. Still no electronics.
Four units + strand coverage →MYP Year 3
Grade 8
Pivot year. Students move from "using" tools to "building" with code and electronics. First hardware purchases go here — a class kit of micro:bits or Arduino Nano clones lives in the Design classroom for the next three grades. Text-based coding (HTML/CSS, Python) replaces pure block coding as the default.
Four units + strand coverage →MYP Year 4
Grade 9
Independence and depth. Students lead their own research and take fuller responsibility for design decisions. Units are longer in student-work terms even if calendar-equal. Sensor-based projects become the norm. The design folder begins to resemble the MYP Year 5 e-portfolio standard.
Four units + strand coverage →MYP Year 5
Grade 10
Capstone. Every unit is now at MYP Year 5 / e-portfolio standard. Students work to the full strand language ("explains and justifies," "detailed and accurate," "fully justified"). The year culminates in a portfolio publication drawing from every prior grade's work, functioning as a bridge to DP Design Technology, DP Computer Science, or DP Visual Arts.
Four units + strand coverage →Reference
Assessment, ATL Skills & Practicalities
How the design folder works, AI Use Log templates from Grade 6 to Grade 10, ATL skills alignment, unit pacing, strand scaffolding, interdisciplinary units, and contingency planning.
Read →Reference
Budget & Equipment Plan
A five-year, ~4,000 RMB equipment strategy: digital-first early grades, class hardware kits that accumulate year over year, and an all-free software stack chosen for reliability in China.
Read →Reference
Classroom Agreements
The three signed agreements every Design student makes: digital citizenship, honest AI use, and care of shared hardware.
Read →