In physics and chemistry, the development of problem-solving skills is necessary to become an expert. A simple cognitive model to analyse such development is proposed and tested. An exploratory research was conducted with expert professors and students in initial and advanced years. A think aloud procedure was used to obtain relevant data while…

Globally, nations are grappling with massive social and economic disruptions and the disparities exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The world is in the middle of a wicked problem--one so complex that it is difficult to find a solution. The "Story Model" was developed as a transdisciplinary curriculum model and a collaborative…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to know the extent to which a decision-making framework assists in providing holistic, comprehensive descriptions of strategies used by school leaders engaging with distributed leadership practices. The process by which principals and other education leaders interact various school-based actors to arrive at a…

The present study examines the difficulties novice data modelers face when asked to provide a data model addressing a given problem. In order to map these difficulties and their causes, two short data modeling problems were given to 82 students who had completed an introductory course in database modeling. Both problems involve three entity sets…

In linear programming, many students find it difficult to translate a verbal description of a problem into a valid mathematical model. To better understand this, we examine the existing characteristics of college engineering students' errors across linear programming (LP) problems. We examined textbooks to identify the types of problems typically…

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…

Constructing an intuitive theory from data confronts learners with a "chicken-and-egg" problem: The laws can only be expressed in terms of the theory's core concepts, but these concepts are only meaningful in terms of the role they play in the theory's laws; how can a learner discover appropriate concepts and laws simultaneously, knowing…

We present noncompetitive adsorption as "particles in a box with one sticky wall." We start with a general model that can be modeled as a simple ordinary differential equation (ODE). To verify the ODE students run a computer simulation. The ODE's solution imperfectly fits the simulation's data. This leads to the diffusion partial…

The Corvette Problem is a nonroutine investigation, one that provides an authentic context to explore many interrelated calculus ideas. In our years of sharing this problem with students and colleagues, we have found additional topics from the calculus curriculum to have rich interpretations in this environment. The Corvette Problem contextualizes…

Heat and enthalpy are challenging topics for general chemistry students because they are conceptually complex and require avariety of quantitative problem-solving approaches. Expert chemists draw on conditional knowledge, deciding when and under what conditions a certain problem-solving approach should be used. Decision-based learning (DBL)…

Mathematical modeling involves using mathematics to represent, analyze, and make predictions or decisions about real- world situations. Garfunkel and Montgomery (2016) elaborate on six components of the mathematical modeling process, including identifying the problem, making assumptions and identifying variables, doing the math, analyzing and…

Background/purpose: This study investigated the effectiveness of Problem-Based Worksheets (PBWs) in improving conceptual understanding of logic gates. PBWs were designed with key characteristics that integrate authentic problem-solving, active student engagement, and conceptual scaffolding to support critical thinking processes. A total of 32…

Background: Research on teaching and learning for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) subjects has increased, and has demonstrated the importance of integrating interdisciplinary knowledge and skills. Our research model was based on the theory of planned behavior (TPB) and the data were analyzed by partial least…

Building scientific arguments is a central ability for all scientists regardless of their specific domain. In organic chemistry, building arguments is a necessary skill to estimate reaction processes in consideration of the reactivities of reaction centres or the chemical and physical properties. Moreover, building arguments for multiple reaction…

The current study addresses the limited research on knowledge acquisition in Project-Based Learning (PjBL) and assesses its development using a Multidimensional Curriculum Model (MdCM) among 563 elementary and secondary school students in Israel. The mixed-method approach involves a quantitative pre-post design, comparing intervention groups who…