Transcript Problem solving skills - Higher Education Academy

Problem solving skills
Is it possible to teach problem solving
skills?
‘Problem solving is a cognitive processing directed at
achieving a goal where no solution method is obvious to
the problem solver’
What Skills are Used in Problem
Solving?
• Making judgements
• Analytical skills
• Decision making
• Collecting information
• Planning
Survey of Key Skills: Problem-solving
• During the past two years, have you been involved in
any activity, whether inside or outside school/college,
in which you critically reviewed an idea, concept or
theory
• During the past two years, have you been involved in
any activity, whether inside or outside school/college,
in which you questioned or cross-examined someone to
extract some information?
• During the past two years, have you been involved in
any activity, whether inside or outside school/college,
in which you identified the information needed to solve
a problem?
What are your issues with
the teaching of Problem-Solving?
How do you solve problems?
• What processes do you use?
• Can you explain them to another person?
• Do these processes vary depending upon the
problem?
• Use of Cognitive Interviewing…...
Problem solving skills - what do we
know about people who are good at it?
• What is an expert?
• Someone who knows the domain
thoroughly - solving problems comes
naturally?
• Someone who can think of things to do
even when no clear solutions suggests
itself?
Expert problem solvers
• Have a better memory for relevant details in
the problem
• Classify problems according to their
underlying principles
• Use well-established procedures
• Work forwards towards a goal (rather than
backwards)
Model of Learning
Content Understanding
Collaboration
Problem-solving
Learning
Communication
Self-regulation
Requirements for Problem-Solving
Content
Understanding
Domain-dependent
problem-solving
strategies
Metacognition
Planning
Self-monitoring
Self-regulation
Motivation
Effort
Self-efficacy
Understanding the Process:
‘How to Solve it’
• Engage: I want to and I can
Read the problem (and all the information)
Listen to the tutor
Learn about the situation that poses the problem
Motivation
Overcome panic
Understanding the Process:
‘How to Solve it’
• Understand the problem: define
Put time in to defining the problem:
Discuss the problem
Ask questions
Can it be visualised?
Restate the problem in your own words
Explain the problem to someone else
Understanding the Process:
‘How to Solve it’
• Plan a procedure to solve the problem
Prior experience?
Data available
Content knowledge
Patterns
Estimation
Alternate solutions
Feasibility
Understanding the Process:
‘How to Solve it’
• Collection of required data & knowledge
May be necessary to reach a solution on imperfect
knowledge
Understanding the Process:
‘How to Solve it’
• Select preferred solution: use and evaluate
Check each step
Can you determine clearly that each step is correct?
Can you prove that each step is correct?
Understanding the Process:
‘How to Solve it’
• Reflect on the process
Are you certain you solved the problem?
Can you check the result and your argument?
Can use alternate solutions?
What did you actually do? Can you explain this to
another?
Can you use the result &/or method for another
problem?
Defining the problem
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Collect all the relevant information
Clarify background issues
What are the constraints?
Are there sub-problems that can be dealt
with separately?
• Can the problem now be formulated?
Brainstorming
• Brainstorm to produce a wide range of
possible solutions to the problem
• Record uncritically/no comments at this
stage
• Use a group of people
• Divergent thinking
Information required
• In biosciences we can do experiments
which are carefully designed, implemented
and controlled
• There is a vast amount of information in the
literature
• Collate the data accumulated - are there
trends and relationships that help?
Bringing back the data
• Collection of the data needs to be followed
by presentation to the group
• Person doing this will need to digest the
information
• Person doing this will need some
presentation skills
• Critical thinking skills required
Do we have a preferred solution?
• What criteria can be devised?
• Evaluate each possible solution in the light
of these criteria
• Reject solutions that do not meet these
criteria
• Judgements - strengths and weaknesses
• Now have one or two solutions that meet
the criteria?
Reflection
• How efficient was the process, how could it
be made more efficient next time?
• Were the problems in definitions, finding
information, understanding information?
• How are critical faculties increasing?
• Did the group work effectively?
• What would you change next time?
Which of these skills can be
taught?
• Finding information - vocabulary,
library/web skills
• Reading the literature - format and
conventions used in papers
• Presenting information - how to organise
data, prepare graphs and tables, talk to a
group, make a poster
• Practice at all of these will increase critical skills
Developing problem-solving skills
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Make tacit processes explicit
Get students to talk about the problem
Provide guided practice
Ensure that the component procedures are
learned
Problem solving skills
• Basic knowledge of facts and ways of doing
things
• Metacognition - how one uses what one
knows
• Heuristics - strategies and techniques (find
an easier, related problem)
• Beliefs - this problem can be solved
(positive attitude)
Understanding the problem
• Discuss it, ask questions
• Draw a picture
• Restate in your own words/tell someone
else about it
• Restate the information given
• Restate the question
Cunning plan
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Have we ever done one like this before?
Do we have of the data needed?
Is there a pattern in the data?
Construct a table or a picture?
What is the answer likely to be?
Would an experiment help?
Reflection
• Describe how we did it
• Which techniques were most useful?
• Can you explain how you did it to someone
else?
• Is there another way of doing it?
• Does the solution raise any interesting
problems?
Primary Issues for Students
• Have confidence in your skill
• Be able to describe/visualise the problem in your
own terms
• Be able to describe your thought processes
• Be able to identify issues, set goals and
define problems
• Be organised and systematic, with frequent
monitoring
• Be creative and don’t be afraid to try different
avenues
• Identify criteria and use these criteria to prioritise
• Access and use knowledge astutely
Strategies and Good Practice in
Developing Problem-solving Skills
• Embedded or separate?
Total embedding
Explicit embedding
Parallel development of skills
Strategies and Good Practice in
Developing Problem-solving Skills
•Group or individual?
Problem-solving skills will be discovered and recognised
with the group, and drawn upon
When there is a time limit, individuals will be faster!
Groups provide opportunity for greater innovationBRAINSTORMING
The larger the group, the more ideas available
The larger the group, the less the involvement
Individuals more likely to show vulnerability and doubt
Problem-solving Skills:
Assessment
Problem recognition tasks
• Examples of common problems are presented. Students
are asked to identify the basic type of problem represented
• Recognition of problem type is the first step to solving the
problem
• Appropriate in quantitative and technical courses, but could
also be used to evaluate global problem-solving skills
Problem-solving Skills:
Assessment
What’s the Principle?
• Once a type of problem is correctly identified, students
must identify which of the principles involved in the class
must be applied to solve the problem
• Assists in the understanding that general types of problems
can be solved with the individual principles involved in class
• Appropriate for traditional science and technology courses
and humanities and social sciences subjects
Problem-solving Skills:
Assessment
Documented Problem Solutions
• Asks students to keep track of the steps involved in
solving particular types of problems
• Lets faculty understand how students approach problems
as well as understand how they comprehend and describe
problem-solving procedures
• Useful in subjects that involve mathematical or numerical
processing and analysis
Problem-solving Skills:
Assessment
Background Knowledge Probe
• Questionnaires that examine students’ knowledge of
the subject as they enter a module
• Useful as a stand-alone method to determine the most
appropriate level to begin instruction
• Content-driven. Can be used to indicate significant
material