Design is an innovative endeavor driven by the desire to create new products. It engages and uses people's mental, personal and productive skills. In architecture, the design process confronts with complex, conflicting and challenging issues. This requires of a wide range of information as well as the application of critical and creative thinking techniques. When it comes to teaching and learning design thinking, there is no consensus ont effective practices.
As a result, it is necessary to investigate the methodology in design education that stimulates students' creative thinking. The aim of the study is to equip students with the capacity for critical, independent and original thinking, without relying on their instructors or imitating previous precedents, and to promote a studio culture. In this study, a qualitative approach (semi-structured interview and guided qualitative content analysis (QCA)) has been used to advance the research objective. Library sources and field methods (interviews and questionnaires) were used to data collection and research information according to a hybrid approach. In the first sub-study, due to the necessity of adopting an expert approach and receiving specialized opinions, snowball sampling was used to select the samples. A total of 16 people participated in this study and the information and materials obtained were analyzed using open and axial coding. In the second sub-study, questionnaires were collected from 105 statistical samples in Tehran and Karaj universities, both Azad and public, in the field of architecture in 3 groups. , flexible, metaphorical, strategic, creative and critical thinking, is considered very important in addressing the multifaceted challenges of this field. As well as, during the exchange of ideas and experiences from the studied samples, a lot of emphasis was placed on cultivating a natural network of relationships between students and graduates with a primary focus on cultivating critical thinking skills.