1.2 Problem-Solving in Your Community

Welcome to your first steps in the ICT Club project!

In this phase, you’re not building an app yet — you’re doing something even more important: finding the right problem to solve.

This is called ideation — the process of coming up with creative ideas. It’s not always easy, but it’s the foundation of your entire project!

This lesson focuses on applying our ICT skills to create positive change where we live and connect. Get ready for Activity Days: Finding the Problem Edition!

Focus: Community-Based Problem-Solving!

This isn’t just theory; it’s about action! We’ll be applying our knowledge to real-world issues, understanding the needs around us, and finding innovative solutions.

In this lesson, we will:

Understand Types of Problems: We’ll explore different categories of problems that communities face.
Learn about the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): We’ll discover how these global goals can help us frame local problems.
Identify Different Communities You Belong To: We’ll think about the various communities we’re part of and where our impact can be greatest.
Begin Documenting Your Community’s Needs: We’ll learn how to observe, research, and gather information about the challenges our communities face.
Brainstorm Problems You’d Like to Solve in Your Community: We’ll put on our thinking caps and generate ideas for problems we can tackle using technology.

(Image: Feet going upstairs with the caption “Your first step! Finding a problem to solve”)

Activity Roadmap:

We’ll be working through the following activities to help us achieve these goals:

Activity 1: Understanding Your Community: Brainstorming communities and identifying characteristics.
Activity 2: Understanding Your Community: Field trip! Observing and learning about your chosen community firsthand.
Activity 3: Categorizing Problems: Linking example problems to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Activity 4: Brainstorming Problems: Generating a wide range of problem ideas using brainstorming techniques.
Activity 5: Categorizing Problems: Categorizing your brainstormed problems using the UN SDGs.

Why Start with Communities?

One of the best ways to find meaningful problems is to look closely at the communities around you.

A community is any group of people who share something in common. You might be part of:

Your school
Your neighborhood
A religious group
A sports team
An online group or club
A youth group or savings club
Even your own family

Communities can be based on:

Location (where you live or go to school)
Interest (what you like to do)
Identity (what you believe in or care about)
Faith or culture

Stop and Think: Can you name three communities you belong to?

Activity 1: Understanding Your Community (Part 1)

Let’s take a moment to reflect on the communities you know best.

Think of at least four different communities you’re part of or interested in helping. Then choose one to focus on.

Ask yourself:

Who are the people in this community?
What makes this community unique?
What problems or challenges do they face?
What things do they care about most?

Activity 2: Understanding Your Community (Part 2)

Now it’s time to go out and observe.

Take a mini field trip around your chosen community. This could be around your school, neighborhood, village, or church.

While observing, ask:

What are people doing?
Are there any problems or challenges people seem to face often?
What’s missing in this community?
What services could be improved?

Take notes, sketch what you see, or talk to others to gather insights.

This will help you identify real-world problems worth solving.

Activity 3: Categorizing Example Problems

Once you’ve identified a few possible problems, it’s useful to categorize them using the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

U.N. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS

🧭 What Are the SDGs?

The SDGs are 17 global goals created to help the world become a better place. They address issues like:

Poverty
Hunger
Education
Health
Gender equality
Climate change
Clean water
Decent jobs
Peace and justice

👉 You can explore the full list here:
UN Sustainable Development Goals

Think about which goals are most related to the problems you see in your community. This will give your work direction and global meaning!

💭 Activity 4: Brainstorming Problems

Now that you know your community and understand the SDGs, it’s time to come up with as many problem ideas as you can!

This is called brainstorming — and the goal is to generate lots of ideas, without judging them.

✨ Brainstorming Tips

Every idea is welcome — even wild ones!
Don’t criticize your teammates’ ideas
Build on each other’s thoughts
Be visual — draw your ideas if needed
Stay focused, but have fun!

Here are some examples to get you thinking:

Students walking long distances to school
No clean water at a health center
Too much plastic waste in your community
Girls missing school during menstruation
Students struggling with revision or homework

Activity 5: Categorizing Your Brainstormed Problems

Once you’ve listed several problem ideas, take a moment to group them under the SDGs. This helps:

Make your ideas more organized
Identify which areas are most important
Choose a strong, meaningful problem to work on as a team

For example:

“Lack of clean water” relates to SDG 6: Clean Water & Sanitation
“Teenage pregnancy” could relate to SDG 3: Good Health and Well-being and SDG 5: Gender Equality

Reflection Time

This lesson takes thought and teamwork. Before we move forward, take a moment to reflect:

What did you learn about your community today?
Did you discover a new problem you hadn’t noticed before?
Which activity was most useful to your team?
What ideas are you most excited to explore?

Key Terms to Remember

Ideation – Coming up with creative ideas
Community – A group of people with something in common
Brainstorming – Generating many ideas quickly
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) – 17 global goals created by the United Nations to build a better world

(Image: 3 Squares and one diamond UN SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS)

UN Sustainable Development Goals

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are 17 goals that the United Nations has agreed are important to solve. They include 5 main areas:

Basic human needs and rights: Such as water, food, sleep, clothing, shelter, and good education.
Environment: Such as climate action, access to clean water, and renewable energy.
Safety needs: Such as health, well-being, and safety against accidents and illness.
Social needs: Such as friendships, family, acceptance by others, respect, productivity.
Individual action: Such as equality, peace, and justice.

Here’s a brief overview of each SDG with images and links:

SDG 1: No Poverty – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/poverty/
SDG 2: Zero Hunger – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/hunger/
SDG 3: Good Health and Well-being – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/health/
SDG 4: Quality Education – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/education/
SDG 5: Gender Equality – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/gender-equality/
SDG 6: Clean Water and Sanitation – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/water-and-sanitation/
SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/energy/
SDG 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/economic-growth/
SDG 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/infrastructure-industrialization/
SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/inequality/
SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/cities/
SDG 12: Responsible Consumption and Production – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sustainable-consumption-production/
SDG 13: Climate Action – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/climate-change/
SDG 14: Life Below Water – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/oceans/
SDG 15: Life on Land – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/forests/
SDG 16: Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/peace-justice-strong-institutions/
SDG 17: Partnerships for the Goals – https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/globalpartnerships/

Video: What are the Sustainable Development Goals?

(Image: Brainstorming – two heads with ideas coming out the top)

Brainstorming

After observing your community, you might have identified some good problems you want to work on, or you might still be uncertain. So, let’s try to think of more problems you can tackle by brainstorming.

Brainstorming is a group activity meant to generate a large number of ideas. As you brainstorm, you might feel vulnerable as you contribute different ideas. This is normal!

Brainstorming Tips

Be sure to capture all ideas, even wild ones!
No judgement, on other people’s ideas, or on your own!
Build off each other’s ideas.
One conversation at a time – don’t cut each other off.
Be visual – you can draw instead of writing words.
Go for as many ideas as you can.
Stay focused.

How NOT to Brainstorm

Here’s a short video to illustrate effective brainstorming:

Problem First – Focus on finding the problem. Don’t start with a solution!)

Activity 4: Brainstorming Problems

Estimated Time: 20 minutes
Instructions: Using your brainstorming strategy, follow the instructions in Worksheet. Start to brainstorm different problem ideas based on issues you uncovered when thinking about Community or looking at the UN SDGs.

Activity 5: Categorizing Problems (Part 2)

Estimated Time: 20 minutes
Instructions: Follow the instructions in Worksheet. Categorize some of your brainstormed problems according to the UN SDG categories, just like you did with the example problems.

Mentor Tip: Reflection
(Image Sunset and reflection over a lake)

This lesson took A LOT of thought and work. Hopefully it has sparked some ideas for you.
Ask yourself these questions:
Did you learn more about your community?
Did you uncover any new or different problems?
What activities or strategies worked best for your team?

Explore Real Projects – Technovation Girls App Gallery

Looking for inspiration from other students around the world?

Check out real apps and pitch videos from Technovation Girls teams who have participated in previous competitions. These examples can help you understand:

What a good problem looks like
How teams present their ideas
What your final project might look like

Here’s how to explore the App Gallery:

👉 Visit the Technovation App Gallery here:
https://technovationchallenge.org/app-gallery/
🔽 Choose a topic from the dropdown menu — match it with your own problem category. For example:
- Education
- Health
- Environment
- Safety
- Poverty & Inequality
Use the filters to explore apps by:
- Location (e.g. Uganda, Kenya, Global)
- Year (e.g. 2023, 2022)
- Division (Junior or Senior)
Click Apply Filters to see results
🎥 Watch pitch videos to see how other students explained their problem and solution clearly

Tip for ICT Club Teams:
As you explore, write down what you liked about other teams’ projects. What did they do well? What would you do differently? Use these ideas to improve your own app pitch and problem selection.

📚 Additional Resources

“UCC ICT Clubs Program”
📺 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_MuYFQpLt0

Project Examples from Ugandan Schools

While there’s no single app gallery like Technovation, UCC and schools often showcase student innovations on various platforms. Here are a few real projects shared online:

🔹 Mengo Senior School

Students developed apps for school management and climate education.

🔗 Project Feature on Mengo School ICT

🔹 Ntinda View College

Students presented an idea to build a mobile app that helps students access digital learning materials.

Mentioned in: ICT for Schools Uganda News

🧩 Useful Platforms for Practice and Exploration

1. Solve IT with Africa Code Week

Offers coding challenges and local problem-solving competitions.

https://africacodeweek.org/solve-it/

2. Code.org’s Problem Solving Module

Perfect for understanding how to define and solve problems with tech.

https://studio.code.org/s/csd3-2022

🧠 Learning Videos for ICT Club Skills

📽️ “How to Brainstorm Effectively”

▶️ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjR0cE-v34k
(Shows students how to brainstorm creatively as a team)

📽️ “What Are the SDGs?” – UN Official Video

▶️ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNu9P60w_Qg

Final Tip

Don’t just watch and read—discuss what you learn in your club, and think about how these ideas can guide your project. Ask:

What problems did other students solve?
How did they present their ideas?
What tools and methods can we try in our club?

Using ChatGPT to Spark ICT Club Ideas

One of the newest tools that can help during the ideation stage is ChatGPT, created by OpenAI. It’s like having a brainstorming partner that’s available 24/7.

You can ask ChatGPT about:

Common problems in your community
How technology can solve those problems
Creative app or web solutions
Examples of apps related to a specific SDG

Note: ChatGPT gives AI-generated suggestions, so not everything will be 100% factual or complete. Always discuss ideas with your team and mentor and verify any information through other reliable sources.

How to Access ChatGPT

Go to https://chat.openai.com
Sign up for a free account with your email
Start chatting and asking questions!
You’ll receive enough free credits to help you during your ICT Club project

10 ChatGPT Prompts to Spark Ideas for ICT Club Projects

Here are some example questions (prompts) you can copy and paste into ChatGPT to help your team during ideation:

Brainstorming Problems

What are the biggest challenges students face in rural Ugandan schools today?
Suggest common problems young people face in Ugandan communities that could be solved using a mobile app.
What kinds of digital solutions could help improve health and hygiene in low-income communities?

🌱 Linking to SDGs

List some local Ugandan problems that relate to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
How could a school club project support SDG 4: Quality Education in a rural setting?

Thinking Technologically

What are some examples of simple mobile apps that can help solve water access problems?
Suggest app ideas that use Artificial Intelligence to help farmers in Uganda.

Understanding Users & Impact

What questions should we ask people in our community to find out what challenges they face?
How can a mobile app help teenage girls stay in school in Uganda?

Getting Creative

Give me 10 creative project ideas for a school ICT club that uses technology to help the local community.

Final Tip:

Don’t just use the first idea ChatGPT gives you. Treat it like a starting point—then discuss, improve, and localize the idea with your team.

Don’t get discouraged if you haven’t got a solid problem locked down yet. It can take several meetings and discussions to decide on a problem you all care about and want to work together to solve.