Self-report assessments are used frequently in higher education to assess a variety of constructs, including attitudes, opinions, knowledge, and competence. Systems thinking is an example of one competence often measured using self-report assessments where individuals answer several questions about their perceptions of their own skills, habits, or…

Agent-based modeling is a promising tool for familiarizing students with complex systems as well as programming skills. Human-environment systems, for instance, entail complex interdependencies that need to be considered when modeling these systems. This complexity is often neglected in teaching modeling approaches. For a heterogeneous group of…

Understanding the world around us is a growing necessity for the whole public, as citizens are required to make informed decisions in their everyday lives about complex issues. Systems thinking (ST) is a promising approach for developing solutions to various problems that society faces and has been acknowledged as a crosscutting concept that…

The properties and functions of complex systems apply across a variety of domains of science and are at the heart of the solutions to many global crises facing the world today. As such, understanding of complex systems has been increasingly recognized as a core goal of science education. Learning about complexity-related concepts and phenomena is…

Interpreting and creating computational systems models is an important goal of science education. One aspect of computational systems modeling that is supported by modeling, systems thinking, and computational thinking literature is "testing, evaluating, and debugging models." Through testing and debugging, students can identify aspects…

Components of complex systems apply across multiple subject areas, and teaching these components may help students build unifying conceptual links. Students, however, often have difficulty learning these components, and limited research exists to understand what types of interventions may best help improve understanding. We investigated 32 high…

Both complex systems methods (such as agent-based modeling) and computational methods (such as programming) provide powerful ways for students to understand new phenomena. To understand how to effectively teach complex systems and computational content to younger students, we conducted a study in four urban middle school classrooms comparing…

Science and mathematics are becoming computational endeavors. This fact is reflected in the recently released Next Generation Science Standards and the decision to include "computational thinking" as a core scientific practice. With this addition, and the increased presence of computation in mathematics and scientific contexts, a new…

In this two-part study, we examine undergraduate university students' expression of two important system thinking characteristics--dynamic thinking and cyclic thinking--focusing particularly on students of geology. The study was conducted using an Earth systems questionnaire designed to elicit and reflect either dynamic or cyclic thinking. The…

Classroom teaching is a main frontier of the implementation of new curricular ideas in China. The study reported in this article is concerned with the effectiveness of system of classroom teaching (SCT) in chemistry lessons. According to the Systems Science theory, we took a macroscopic view on the SCT, arguing that SCT is a hierarchy of system,…