Background: Problem-solving in early and middle childhood is of high relevance for cognitive developmental research and educational support. Previous research on science problem-solving has focussed on the process and strategies of children handling challenging tasks, but less on providing insights into the cognitive network that enables science…

The use of metacognitive and self-regulated strategies is a potential predictor of problem-solving skills and self-efficacy. However, this potential needs to be seen at the level of knowledge and experience of various attributes and forms of activity. This research aims to see the interaction effect of using metacognitive and self-regulated…

Supporting students to become critical consumers of online information is one of the most urgent agendas in education today. In schools around the world, students are engaging in online information problem solving (IPS) tasks to develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills by searching and evaluating online information. This qualitative…

Collaborative problem-solving (CPS) includes multiple socio-cognitive processes that can be challenging to investigate. Constructing arguments is a key practice at the intersection of CPS and science learning. To understand how students construct arguments and develop science knowledge during CPS, we focus on team synchrony--the extent of…

Coding and digital game design activities have been used in recent years to contribute to students' academic achievement and twenty-first century skills. This study aimed to investigate the effect of the 5E model enriched with coding and digital game design activities (5EECD) on gifted students' academic achievement and problem-solving skills. A…

Considering problem-solving ability as an important qualification in the 21st century that could be developed by instructional methods that allow learners to construct their knowledge via questioning through cooperative learning activities, we conducted action research with the purpose of investigating the effectiveness of inquiry-based and…

This paper describes and compares primary school students' perceptions of science learning skills in a teacher-centered approach (TCA) and in inquiry-based science fieldwork (IBSF). This comparison was prompted by primary school students' perceptions of science learning skills, which has recently gained momentum, and the Namibian primary schools'…

This intervention study examined the effectiveness of instructional support tailored toward two techniques (i.e., random associations and constraint identification) to strengthen children's creative problem-solving skills within upper-elementary science education. Five inquiry-based science lessons with ample opportunity for creative…

Connections among the mathematics, science, and engineering disciplines have been recognized and affirmed in national standards. For example, the application of mathematical ideas and skills within science has been highlighted in national science standards for over 20 years. More recently, the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS; NGSS Lead…

An understanding of how sensemaking unfolds when elementary students engage in engineering design tasks is crucial to advancing engineering teaching and learning at K-12 levels. Sensemaking has been widely studied in the context of science as a discipline. In this paper, we seek to contribute to the more nascent efforts to build theory about the…

Student problems (preconceptions, errors, and learner-specific approaches) that arise when planning and conducting experiments are relevant for lesson planning and the further development of teaching practice overall. student problems are understood as a learning opportunity. So far, little attention has been paid to the relationships between…

Access to drinking water is becoming more limited as drought persists across continents. This article highlights a particularly impacted group of students due to increasing drought conditions and upstream river pollution near their reservation. While there are related water and modeling standards across the K-12 Next Generation Science Standards…

This study examined the impact of STEM applications realized with 4th-grade elementary school students on their problem-solving skills. The study was conducted within the convergent parallel design framework, a mixed research method. The research was carried out with 42 4th-grade primary school students, 21 in the experimental group and 21 in the…

Digital instructional tools, such as virtual manipulatives, have been widely adopted as an enhanced approach to inquiry-based learning. However, the optimal ratio of mobile devices to students in instructional settings remain controversial. This research introduced a counterbalanced quasi-experiment to compare the learning performance and…

Energy concepts are taught in many schools, but children rarely have an opportunity to grapple with energy problems and work on their own solutions. This study explores the impacts of Connect Science, a service-learning (SL) program developed to enhance elementary students' energy literacy in the United States. Program impacts were explored within…