SCAMPER

Preparation

01 · Define the focus

Choose what will be explored with SCAMPER: a workshop activity, a product, a service, a process, a curriculum, a communication strategy, etc.
The more specific the focus, the more concrete the generated ideas will be.

02 · Prepare the SCAMPER cards or poster

Write the 7 letters with their meaning on separate cards or on a poster visible to everyone.
Add 2-3 trigger questions under each letter to facilitate idea generation.

03 · Materials for recording ideas

The facilitator explains the SCAMPER acronym and its logic: not inventing from scratch, but transforming what already exists.
Presents the session focus: "Today we'll use SCAMPER to explore new ways of doing [X]."

Go through each letter, one at a time, or have subgroups work different letters in parallel.
For each letter, read the trigger questions and give 3-5 minutes for each person (or subgroup) to generate ideas without filtering.
Capture all ideas on sticky notes or a shared space, without evaluating or discarding yet.

Each subgroup shares its ideas with the plenary.
The group identifies the most promising ideas: Which are most innovative? Which are most feasible? Which open possibilities that had not been considered?

Selected ideas are developed further: How would this idea be implemented? What resources would it need? Who could do it?

Which idea or ideas do we move forward with? Who takes responsibility for exploring them further?

Poster or cards with the SCAMPER acronym and its questions

Sticky notes and markers

Whiteboard or wall for posting and organizing ideas

Timer to keep pace through each letter

Digital tools

For virtual sessions or collaborative documentation.

Not all 7 letters need to be covered in a single session: choosing 3-4 most relevant to the challenge is enough to generate valuable ideas.

Reinforce the no-evaluation rule during generation: the "craziest" ideas often open paths that obvious ones cannot see.

If the group gets stuck on a letter, skip to the next and return: moving between prompts activates new connections.

SCAMPER works very well as a creative warm-up before a deeper design session.

In educational contexts: apply it so students themselves redesign how they learn, are assessed, or organize themselves.

Document everything: discarded ideas today may be exactly what the group needs at another moment.

Trigger questions for each letter:

S – Substitute: What component, person, material, or step could be replaced by another? What would happen if we used a different resource?
C – Combine: What ideas, activities, or elements could be merged? What would happen if we joined two things we had never put together?
A – Adapt: What is someone doing well in another context that we could bring here? How would this methodology look if applied in a completely different setting?
M – Modify/Magnify/Minify: What would happen if we made it 10 times bigger? And 10 times smaller? What would change if we sped up the process or slowed it down?
P – Put to other uses: What else could this be used for that we had not thought of? What different contexts could benefit from this idea?
E – Eliminate: What could we remove without losing value? What is the minimum needed for this to work?
R – Rearrange/Reverse: What would happen if we reversed the order of steps? What if we started from the end? What emerges if we look at this backwards?

Variants:

Individual SCAMPER: Each person works alone before sharing in the group, to avoid groupthink.
Rotation SCAMPER: Different groups work different letters and then share results.
Speed SCAMPER: 1 minute per letter, non-stop, to force lateral thinking.
SCAMPER applied to methodologies: Use SCAMPER to redesign a familiar activity and generate new variants.

Eberle, B. (1971). SCAMPER: Games for Imagination Development. DOK Publishers.
Osborn, A. F. (1953). Applied Imagination: Principles and Procedures of Creative Problem-Solving. Scribner.
Michalko, M. (2006). Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques (2nd ed.). Ten Speed Press.