We actually had our students DO the handshaking activity. Then I had Popsicle sticks for them to use when constructing a fence for the fence problem.
Having the students draw pictures. I will go around the room and pick different visuals and have them present those to the class so they can see different ways of coming up with the same answer.
I like the ideas of giving the students the option to create their own visuals. They can choose their favorite app, whiteboard, poster/paper, powerpoint, etc. Whatever fits their learning style best. How do you want me to add a visual to my writing for this activity? Can you please provide more direction?
My favorite is drawing a diagram or picture.
Fencepost problem:
|–1--|–2--|–3--|–4--|–5--|–6--|–7--|–8--|–9--|–10–|--11–|--12–|
13 vertical fence posts
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I let students demonstrate different methods. This allows for a variety of methods, so of which I would not have thought of on my own.
I simply like the visual of using the handshake demostration with the entire class. They get it more vividly this way.
I was out the day we had this lesson. A sub actually taught this lesson. She is a certified teacher and was able to meet with me and go over the lesson with me before hand. She reported back to me the response from the students was very good.
This is exactly the same visual that I used, except that Amber’s fence is a little bit better drawn! 
I am a visual learner, as I’m sure some of my students will be, so having ideas for visuals will be a must for me.
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I really like demonstrating how drawing pictures is helpful in solving real world problems. I try and give students problems to solve that will encourage them to draw pictures, and then point out to them how it was important. They tend not to believe that drawing pictures helps until they have done it themselves.
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I used graphs, tree diagram for the shaking hands problem, pencils to represent fence problem
I like to physically act out the problem solving…have students stand in a straight line and use their arms as fence rails would demonstrate the fence problem AND include the students.
I draw a lot on my Surface Pro 3. However, I like students to take a shot at crating their own visuals before I introduce mine. I don’t want the way my mind works to distract them from how they use visuals for learning and problem solving.
We did the activity of passing a ball around our group and making it around in under 2 seconds. (They started at 1:30 minutes!) Each student had to make a visual of the problem solving process afterwards and several kids used photos of their class going through that activity. It had a lasting impact on them!
made drawing supplies available, some students went to blackboard…lots of pictures…some students used pencils and pens to model the fence question
I don’t have a favorite visual problem solving technique.
The visual I find to be most effective in the problem solving process is having the students act out the problem. It gives students the opportunity to move around and have a clear representation of the problem. If there are not enough students for the problem my second visual technique is to draw a representation of the problem, i.e. flowchart etc.
Drawing was the most effective for this problem. I also had students use their fingers and we had to use the entire class to answer some problems.
I start with a riddle every day and demo the solution using some sort of manipulative, with volunteers acting it out, etc. I try to get them to see that it’s more than you and your brain to work out complex problems.
I use a variety of visuals from video presentations, to powerpoints or basic images found on the internet to hand drawn sketches and student/teach demonstrations in front of the class.
As previously stated, and important part of the engineering design problem solving process is the model/test phase. This is the obvious place for visuals because if the potential solution is a physically tangible one, then there is some form of model/drawing/prototype etc. If not, flow-maps, Gant charts, storyboards etc provide the visual means of representing the potential solution.