Background: The International Performance Assessments of Learning (iPAL) project developed a framework for the construction of performance assessments for testing critical thinking, which proposes structuring them around a problem situation that sets an authentic (i.e., real-life-like) problem-solving task for the test-taker. Its critical thinking…

With the introduction of "Next Generation Science Standards" ("NGSS"), teachers have been called to find meaningful and engaging ways to teach science content while incorporating engineering practices and, to a lesser extent, computing and computational thinking. The task becomes even more complex when they also have to…