Imagination is necessary for scientific practice, yet there are no in vivo sociological studies on the ways that imagination is taught, thought of, or evaluated by scientists. This article begins to remedy this by presenting the results of a qualitative study performed on two systems biology laboratories. I found that the more advanced a…

Analysis of collisions is standardly included in the introductory physics course. In one dimension (1D), there do not seem to be any unusual issues: Typically, the initial velocities of the two colliding objects are specified, and the problem is to find the final velocities. In 1D there are therefore two unknown variables. One can write the…

We present a technique that examines handwritten equations from a student's solution to an engineering problem and from this estimates the correctness of the work. More specifically, we demonstrate that lexical properties of the equations correlate with the grade a human grader would assign. We characterize these properties with a set of features…

Membrane separation processes, from reverse osmosis to ultrafiltration to microfiltration, are gradually receiving more and more emphasis in undergraduate chemical engineering curricula. Of these processes, ultrafiltration tends to be the most amenable to the standard chemical engineering approach of theory development, mass and/or energy…

The "big bad wolf" chased the squealing children around the playground as they looked for a place to hide. Because Mr. Lòpez and Ms. Kim had introduced the work of engineers and the engineering design process into their unit on The Three Little Pigs, they knew their preschool students would choose a structure that could withstand any…

Mathematical representation has an essential role in solving mathematical problems. However, there are still many mathematics education students who have difficulty in representing ill-structured problems. Even though the ill-structured-problem-solving tasks designed to help mathematics education students understand the relevance and…

Problem-based learning (PBL) is an innovative educational approach that dates back to the 1960s. However, the twenty-first century goal of sustainable education poses a challenge to PBL, especially as it relates to isolation. Here we discuss the underlying issue of isolation in three respects. First, the information-processing model of PBL depends…

There is broad agreement among executives on the importance of innovation and creativity in organizations. The paper aimed to provide information on the effectiveness of a new cognitive style inventory, the Productive-Reproductive Thinking Inventory (P-R), in identifying people with creative problem-solving potential. Participants completed the…

This article tries to show that combining opportunities to imitate and study with self-inspired and autonomous activities can facilitate the exploitation and exploration of different kinds of knowledge and ways of learning. This approach might inform leaders' and teachers' education and development with a focus on promoting students' capability…

Eye tracking is getting increasingly popular in mathematics education research. Studies predominantly rely on the so-called eye-mind hypothesis (EMH), which posits that what persons fixate on closely relates to what they process. Given that the EMH was developed in reading research, we see the risk that implicit assumptions are tacitly adopted in…

When characterizing students' item-solving strategies, methods such as interviews and think-aloud protocols are often used. However, these measures provide limited information about sub-or preconscious signals and cognitive processes that also affect students' item-solving strategies and abilities. A growing number of researchers in chemical…

Collaborative problem solving (CPS) has been deemed a critical twenty-first century competency for a variety of contexts. However, less attention has been given to work aimed at the assessment and acquisition of such capabilities. Recently large scale efforts have been devoted toward assessing CPS skills, but there are no agreed upon guiding…

This paper details an exploratory study of 14 elementary prospective teachers (PTs) solving purposefully crafted, two-digit addition problems. The numbers in each problem were chosen to elicit diverse solution strategies. We coded 95 responses based on the ways the PTs completed the calculation (for example, by referring to the number as…

Through problem solving especially in the chemistry courses, individuals are required to solve difference types of problems both in traditional and innovative ways, and to reveal different points of views. Both correct results and correct units are achieved through the conversion factors. The fact that the teacher candidates approach problem…

Homework is considered as a substantial process of learning especially for engineering education. However, due to the fast development of network technology, students now can easily find solution manuals on the internet. While some students use solution manuals to study, there are quite a few students who just copy homework solutions and lose…