The model answers below are taken from a members-only video lesson.
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Speaker: Finn
I’d like to talk about my little sister, who came up with a surprisingly clever solution to a problem a few years ago.
She was about ten at the time, and we were having a family barbecue in our garden. My dad had put a large plastic table outside, and we’d placed all the food on it. At some point, the wind suddenly picked up, and the tablecloth started blowing around. We tried putting plates and bottles on it to hold it down, but every time a strong gust came along, part of the tablecloth would lift up and knock things over.
My dad was getting annoyed and was about to take the whole table inside when my sister suggested using some clothes pegs from the laundry room. She said we could clip the tablecloth directly to the edge of the table instead of putting heavy things on top of it.
It sounded almost too simple, but we tried it. We put a few pegs around the edges, and it worked immediately. The tablecloth stayed firmly in place, and we didn’t have to keep putting everything back.
What I found clever was that she didn’t try to make the tablecloth heavier, which was what we’d been doing. Instead, she realized that the real problem was the wind getting underneath it, so she simply attached it to the table. It was a very simple idea, but none of the adults had thought of it.
I also remember my dad laughing and saying, “Why didn’t I think of that?” My sister wasn’t trying to show off or prove that she was clever. She just looked at the problem and came up with an idea that seemed obvious once she’d said it.
So I wouldn’t say she’s especially inventive in general. She’s just an ordinary kid who happened to look at a simple problem from a different perspective. I think that’s what made her solution so clever.
Speaker:Blondie
I’d have to choose my grandma for this one. She’s always been the person who keeps our family together. She’s incredibly warm and easygoing, but she’s also quite sharp and good at dealing with awkward situations.
The problem happened last summer during our annual family reunion. My grandfather had passed away a few months earlier, and he had left behind a beautiful vintage acoustic guitar that he used to play at almost every family gathering. Naturally, all of his adult children wanted it. My dad, my two uncles and my aunt all had emotional attachments to it, so nobody really wanted to give it up.
By the second day, things had become quite uncomfortable. People weren’t openly arguing, but there were lots of little comments about who had been closest to Grandpa or who appreciated his music the most. Everyone knew that if Grandma simply chose one of her children, someone would probably feel hurt.
Then, on the final evening, Grandma brought the guitar into the living room and suggested a simple solution. She said that whoever could play Grandpa’s favourite song the best should get it.
At first, everyone was surprised because none of the adults actually knew how to play. Then my ten-year-old cousin Leo raised his hand. He told us that Grandpa had been teaching him to play for the past year.
Leo sat down and played the song. He wasn’t perfect, but he managed to play the whole thing, and everyone was genuinely moved.
I thought Grandma’s solution was clever because she avoided choosing between her children. Instead of deciding who deserved the guitar most, she created a fair criterion that nobody could really argue with. And because Leo was the only person who could actually play, the guitar ended up with someone who could continue what Grandpa had loved doing.
I don’t think Grandma had planned it all in advance. She simply saw that the argument was going nowhere and found a different way to look at the problem. That’s what made her solution so clever.
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