Growing financial concerns among college students and on college campuses suggests urgency in teaching personal finance more effectively. Active learning approaches to teaching, including the use of case studies, problem-based learning, group work, in-class writing, demonstrations, and so forth, may be more appropriate and useful when used to…

The use of modeling projects serves to integrate, reinforce, and extend student knowledge. Here we present two projects related to tumor growth appropriate for a first course in differential equations. They illustrate the use of problem-based learning to reinforce and extend course content via a writing or research experience. Here we discuss…

In this paper, we examine the role of the instructor during student-centered approaches, specifically those that are problem-centered, to outline effective strategies that are valuable for facilitating discussions. After describing the role of the instructor in each phase of implementation, from planning to evaluation, we discuss specific…

Argumentation is central to instruction centered on socio-scientific issues (Sadler & Donnelly in "International Journal of Science Education," 28(12), 1463-1488, 2006. doi: 10.1080/09500690600708717). Teachers can play a big role in helping students engage in argumentation and solve authentic scientific problems. To do so, they need…

Creative and critical thinking skills are the abilities, which can sometimes be used interchangeably in definition. In fact, they have different constructs because they differentiate in outcome of human behaviours. Also one of today's requirements is that individuals should approach everyday problems by using both competences. So, one of the…

Vocabulary is at the surface level of language usage; thus, students need to develop mathematical and scientific vocabulary to be able to explicitly communicate their mathematical and scientific reasoning with others. The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) and the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) have both created…

Advancements in technology and liberalization of educational opportunities have transformed the knowledge landscape into an emergent innovation incubator, where sense-making and creativity in and for ill-structured environments are especially relevant. In addition, opportunities are often "found" or "made." The quality of…

Attention on P-20 science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education has increased tremendously in recent years. Many efforts are underway to promote STEM major and career selection across the nation; specifically, in engineering and computer science. The authors' purpose was to examine an underlying profile combinations of latent…

Some of the 21st century proficiencies expected from people are determined as collaborative working and problem solving. One way to gain these proficiencies is by using collaborative problem solving based on social constructivism theory. Collaborative problem solving is one of the methods allowing for social constructivism in the class. In…

Pharmaceutical chemistry, medicinal chemistry and the drug discovery process require experienced practitioners to employ reasoned speculation in generating creative ideas, which can be used to evolve promising molecules into drugs. The ever-evolving world of pharmaceutical chemistry requires university curricula that prepare graduates for their…

This exploratory study investigates the impacts of industry-based externships for K-12 teachers, and reports teachers' perspectives on how these experiences influenced K-12 classroom practices. The program of focus in this research study is the Educators in Industry: K-12 Externship Program. For four weeks in the summer, teacher-participants are…

The critical thinking ability is an indispensable ability of contemporary college students, and the PBL teaching model abandons the shortcomings of traditional teaching methods, which is more suitable for the development trend of university curriculum teaching reform in China. In order to understand the influence of PBL teaching mode on college…

The purpose of this study was to design a problem based collaborative learning environment supported by dynamic web technologies and to examine students' views about this learning environment. The study was designed as a qualitative research. Some 36 students who took an Object Oriented Programming I-II course at the department of computer…

Based on many years' work designing introductory, immersive, aesthetic experiences that lead to problem-based learning (PBL) tasks for student teachers (called "INTRO"), we problematize the concept of creativity and playfulness in Early Childhood Teacher Education (ECTE). The article reports on our analysis of students' experiences of…

Challenged by increased globalisation and fast technological development, we carried out an experiment in the third semester of a global business engineering programme aimed at identifying conditions for training students in dealing with complex and ill-structured problems of forming a new business. As this includes a fuzzy front end, learning…