Design thinking is a user centered process which concerns with real problems that can be solved through empathy with users, rapid prototyping and abductive reasoning. Human Computer Interaction (HCI) provides an in-depth knowledge and understanding of the issues involved in the design, implementation and evaluation of user interfaces for interactive systems. Currently, the traditional mode of teaching is through lecture. However, this technique is not an effective form of teaching for HCI since it encourages a style of thinking that every fact must be covered, that it is the teacher's role to provide all facts through teaching. The students are expected to design and propose an artifact as the class project. Hence the objective of this paper is to determine whether design thinking approach will improve the students' motivation in HCI. 11 students are involved in this study. A questionnaire which is adopted from Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire is used to assess students' feedback on motivations and their learning strategies for the course. The results have shown an increased in students' motivation. © 2017 IEEE.