2024-25 Challenge Previews
The Challenge Experience is Destination Imagination®'s (DI) flagship program for pre-K, K-12 and university students. Teams develop solutions to project-based STEAM challenges and then present their solutions live at tournaments.
DI Challenges are the prompts or guidelines for what a team creates.
The Challenges are open-ended, allowing teams to express themselves creatively and take full ownership of their solutions. Challenges are designed to teach the creative process—a system of learning that is at the root of innovation and a child’s ability to bring an idea to life.
DI Challenges take on two distinct formats:
Team Challenges and Instant Challenges
Team Challenges
Each team selects one new and engaging Team Challenge requiring a solution that will be presented at the tournament. Team Challenges encourage students to explore their passions, discover their unique talents and abilities, and learn new skills. Team Challenges are available each year in the following categories: Technical, Scientific, Fine Arts, Improvisational, Engineering, Service Learning, and Early Learning.
Although each Team Challenge has a specific educational focus, they each also incorporate elements to make them truly multi-disciplinary and cross-curricular (i.e., the Fine Arts Challenge will have a technical element and the Engineering Challenge will have an artistic or storytelling component.)
INSTANT CHALLENGES
Instant Challenges are quick creative and critical-thinking exercises that build teamwork and reinforce problem-solving skills like rapid ideation and implementation.
Instant Challenges can be task-based, performance-based, or a combination of both. All teams practice Instant Challenges during the year and are given one at the tournament.
Here are the 2024 - 25 Team Challenge Previews
Teams are often given the ability to choose the Challenge they want to solve. Some programs assign teams to a certain Challenge based on interests.
Early Learning Challenge
Our Rising Stars for Early Learners Challenge offers simple experiences with the creative process, and it gives young kids (preschool through 2nd grade) a place to work together and make new friends.
Rain, snow, wind, sun, and hail! There are so many different kinds of weather and lots of wonderful activities that can only be done during the perfect kind of weather. Your team will tell a story about a character who is learning about one kind of weather for the very first time. It’s a great day for some outdoor fun!
For the 2024-25 season, Rising Starts teams get to:
- Research different kinds of weather.
- Create and present a play about a character learning about a kind of weather for the very first time.
- Include a teacher character and a special weather activity in the story.
- Design and create a weather costume and a weather special effect.
- Create and present one Team Choice Element that shows off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.
Technical Challenge
The Technical Challenge prompts students to complete tasks by using engineering, research, strategic planning, and related skills.
Build it up and knock it down! In this Challenge, your team will go from the highest heights to the lowest lows as you use team-created equipment to build and destroy stacks of items. What will a character do when their greatest wishes encounter a frustration point? Will it all come tumbling down? Find out in this season’s Technical Challenge!
For the 2024-25 season, teams that choose to solve the Technical Challenge get to:
- Design and build assembly equipment and destruction equipment.
- Use the assembly equipment to create a stack of items.
- Use the destruction equipment to disassemble and/or destroy the stack.
- Create and present a story about a character who lacks something important and attempts to gain it.
- Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.
Engineering Challenge
Our Engineering Challenge asks students to explore and apply engineering skills and tools to design and build solutions to specific applications.
Come one, come all to the greatest show on Earth! Join us for a daring feat of high-wire innovation as you test a transporter that will carry weights along a tournament-provided cord. Present a story in the style of contemporary circus and don’t forget to include a daring display! This season’s Engineering Challenge isn’t clowning around!
For the 2024-25 season, teams that choose to solve the Engineering Challenge get to:
- Design and build a transporter that will be tested during the team’s Presentation.
- Complete weight transport tests to test how much weight the transporter can carry along a tournament-provided cord at various angles.
- Create and present a story in the style of contemporary circus.
- Include a daring display and an ensemble spectacle in the Presentation.
- Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents
Scientific Challenge
Our Scientific Challenge blends the curiosity of scientific research with the creative expression of performance art.
Space, the final frontier…join us for this season’s Scientific Challenge as you explore the cosmos. Your team will tell a story about a character who figures out they are not alone on a planet. Show off your science fiction skills with some out-of-this-world technobabble. What will happen when you go beyond the stars?
For the 2024-25 season, teams that choose to solve the Scientific Challenge get to:
- Create and present a story in which a character who is located on a planet other than Earth thinks they are alone but discovers that they are not.
- Include technobabble in the story.
- Design and build a device and/or effect that demonstrates what the technobabble describes.
- Include a scientific demonstration that shows the science behind why a specific phenomenon of the planet happens and/or exists.
- Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.
Fine Arts Challenge
Our Fine Arts Challenge helps students develop acting and creative skills through artistic media, theater arts, scriptwriting, and prop design.
How can the simplest of things convey the most? Your team will tell a story about something small that can have a big impact and move the audience with an emotional moment. Be strategic with your use of color and shape as you design a big visual impact with your set. It’s time to explore minimalism in this season’s Fine Arts Challenge!
For the 2024-25 season, teams that choose to solve the Fine Arts Challenge get to:
- Create and present a story about how something small and/or simple can create a big impact.
- Include a focal character in the story.
- Include an emotional moment in the story.
- Design and create a minimalist set.
- Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.
Improvisational Challenge
Our Improvisational Challenge is all about research, spontaneity, and storytelling. Teams receive topics and quickly produce skits
From beginning to end, we must travel a path to get where we want to go! Use your improvisational skills to tell a story about a character traveling between two locations. Include a character who is trying to find something and a detour that causes an unforeseen change in the plan or route. It’s time to hit the road with this season’s Improvisational Challenge!
For the 2024-25 season, teams that choose to solve the Improvisational Challenge get to:
- Create and present an improvisational skit about a traveling character.
- Research locations and show the character’s route between a starting location and an ending location.
- Research modes of transportation and incorporate one into the skit.
- Include a seeker and a detour in the skit.
Service Learning Challenge
Our Service Learning Challenge is designed to engage students in public service that addresses real-life community issues.
Left or right, apple or orange, smile or frown…the world is full of choices! Your team will tell a story about a character who must make a critical choice after considering potential outcomes. A binary device will enhance your Presentation by completing two tasks at once! Where will your decisions lead in this season’s Service Learning Challenge?
For the 2024-25 season, teams that choose to solve the Service Learning Challenge get to:
- Identify, design, carry out, and evaluate a project that addresses a need in a real community.
- Create and present a story about a character who must make a critical choice.
- Include at least two potential outcomes and a complication in the story.
- Include a device that completes two different tasks from the same initiation in the Presentation.
- Create and present two Team Choice Elements that show off the team’s interests, skills, areas of strength, and talents.
Instant Challenge (IC)
All teams will have the opportunity to solve an Instant Challenge. These challenges require teams to engage in quick, creative and critical thinking
In a world with growing cultural connections, increased levels and types of communication, and a new need for real-time teamwork and problem-solving, the ability to solve problems quickly is becoming increasingly critical.
Each team will be asked to solve an Instant Challenge for their DI tournament. The team must think on their feet by applying appropriate skills to produce a solution in a short period of time.
Instant Challenges are performance-based, task-based, or a combination of the two. Although each Instant Challenge has different requirements, all Instant Challenges reward teams for their teamwork. Instant Challenges are kept confidential until it is time for teams to solve them.