ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses the problem-solving talk, typifying the nature of collaborative designing and making. It offers practical suggestions for how people might encourage and facilitate exploratory and dialogic talk in design and technology activities to fully exploit children's learning potential. Consequently, children need to learn and use the exploratory language to not only participate in educational activities but because of the potential impact it may have on their individual cognitive development, their peers' learning and their creative output. Although research identifies different types of talk, it is exploratory and dialogic talk that has the greatest potential to drive learning. An understanding of social constructivism helps people realise the key role that talk plays in learning. Market research allows children to debate in a genuinely collaborative and exploratory way which ingredients, components and materials they could choose to answer the design brief.
