The Ultimate Sandwich Challenge is an engaging, open-ended thinking scenario where students invent the world’s greatest sandwich — and design a machine that can make it automatically. Students must think creatively, justify their ideas, solve problems, and refine their solutions.

A High-engagement creative thinking and design thinking activity that gets students excited, collaborating, and thinking deeply.

This flexible, low-prep lesson encourages creative thinking, critical thinking, problem solving, and reflection while supporting meaningful student discussion and engagement.

There is no single correct answer — just powerful thinking.

What Students Will Do

Students will:

✔ Invent the world’s greatest sandwich

✔ Design a sandwich-making machine

✔ Work within real-world constraints

✔ Explain and justify their thinking

✔ Solve unexpected problems

✔ Create an advertisement to persuade customers

✔ Reflect on their thinking

This scenario builds both creative and critical thinking skills in a structured, engaging format.

Why Teachers Love This Resource

✔ High engagement

✔ Low prep

✔ Flexible implementation

✔ Encourages collaboration and discussion

✔ Promotes deep thinking and reasoning

✔ Works across multiple subject areas

How to Use This Resource

This scenario can be used as:

• Whole-class thinking launch

• Small group collaboration

• Independent thinking task

• Enrichment activity

• Inquiry or STEM lesson

• Creative thinking warm-up

Use as a quick 20–30 minute task or extend into a 45–60 minute deep thinking lesson.

Skills Developed

Students develop:

• Creative thinking

• Critical thinking

• Problem solving

• Reasoning and justification

• Collaboration

• Reflection and metacognition

This resource supports:

Australian Curriculum General Capabilities

US Common Core & 21st Century Skills

UK National Curriculum

STEM / STEAM Learning

Inquiry-Based Learning

Gifted & Extension

Perfect For

✔ Stage 2

✔ Stage 3

✔ Gifted & Extension

✔ Inquiry-Based Learning

✔ STEM / STEAM

✔ Critical Thinking Lessons

✔ Fast Finishers

What's Included

✔ Engaging scenario introduction

✔ Creative and critical thinking task

✔ Design and planning prompts

✔ Constraints to deepen thinking

✔ Explain-your-thinking prompts

✔ Problem-solving extension

✔ Persuasive advertisement challenge

✔ Reflection prompts

✔ Teacher notes and suggested uses

Part of the MindStretch Thinking Scenarios Series

This resource is part of the MindStretch Thinking Scenarios Series, designed to help students develop flexible, creative, and confident thinking.

Many teachers use the MindStretch collection to build a shared language of thinking across their classroom.

Low Prep | High Engagement | Deep Thinking

Perfect for teachers looking to stretch student thinking with meaningful, engaging learning experiences.

Want the complete set?

Save money with the full MindStretch Thinking Scenarios Bundle — perfect for building flexible thinking, discussion, creativity, and problem-solving across the year.

Includes multiple engaging scenario challenges designed to deepen student reasoning and engagement.