Nature-inspired designs/organic designs exhibit a very close resemblance with nature especially in terms of form and structure. Form giving for organic design is a special class of design problem that involves the use of inspiration and analogies from nature for creative problem-solving. There is insufficient research in understanding this…

Researchers in physics education have advocated both for including modeling in science classrooms as well as promoting student engagement with sensemaking. These two processes facilitate the generation of new knowledge by connecting to one's existing ideas. Despite being two distinct processes, modeling is often described as sensemaking of the…

The purpose of this paper is to review the utility of think alouds in writing instruction and highlight the function of think-aloud modeling in the development of cognitive and metacognitive strategies that support learners' independence. For these purposes, modeling with coping is also explained. Coping models, in which teachers encounter…

Self-regulated learning (SRL) is a critical component of mathematics problem solving. Students skilled in SRL are more likely to effectively set goals, search for information, and direct their attention and cognitive process so that they align their efforts with their objectives. An influential framework for SRL, the SMART model, proposes that…

Background: Engineering students inconsistently apply equilibrium when solving problems in statics, but few studies have explored why. Visual cognition studies suggest that features of the visual representations we use to teach students influence what domain knowledge they use to solve problems. However, few studies have explored how visual…

Models of physical systems are used to explain and predict experimental results and observations. The Modeling Framework for Experimental Physics describes the process by which physicists revise their models to account for the newly acquired observations, or change their apparatus to better represent their models when they encounter discrepancies…

Self-regulated learning (SRL) is a critical component of mathematics problem-solving. Students skilled in SRL are more likely to effectively set goals, search for information, and direct their attention and cognitive process so that they align their efforts with their objectives. An influential framework for SRL, the SMART model (Winne, 2017),…

Context-based learning aims to make learning more meaningful by raising meaningful problems. However, these types of problems often require reflection and thinking processes that are more complex and thus more difficult for students, putting high demands on students' problem-solving capabilities. In this paper, students' approaches when solving…

There has been a growing interest in the study of writing from the perspective of its potential contribution to language development. However, scant attention has been paid to key methodological considerations regarding the analysis of the connection between L2 writing processes, reflection on language while writing, and language learning. In an…

Many students with Learning Disabilities (LD) experience low motivation and confidence in algebra as a result of the content challenges and the lack of mathematics success they have experienced previously (Kortering, de Bettencourt, & Braziel, 2005). The combination of multiple content deficits, an ongoing lack of success, and low motivation…

Although students often appear to be skilled in retrieving and making use of information from the internet, research shows that their information problem solving skills are overestimated. They show deficiencies in many of the necessary skills, such as generation of search terms, selection of sources, and critical processing of information. It is…

Well-developed, problem-solving skills are essential for any student enrolled in a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) course as well as for graduates in the workforce. One of the most essential skills is the ability to monitor one's own progress and understanding while solving a problem. Successful monitoring during the…

The research paradigm invented by Allen Newell and Herbert A. Simon in the late 1950s dominated the study of problem solving for more than three decades. But in the early 1990s, problem solving ceased to drive research on complex cognition. As part of this decline, Newell and Simon's most innovative research practices--especially their method for…

Empirical evidence on the way in which expert designers from different domains cognitively connect their internal processes with external resources is presented in the context of an extended cognition model. The article focuses briefly on the main trends in the extended design cognition theory and in particular on recent trends in information…

We present a quantitative model for predicting the level of difficulty subjects will experience with specific problems. The model explicitly accounts for the number of subproblems a problem can be broken into and the difficultly of each subproblem. Although the model builds on previously published models, it is uniquely suited for blending with…