Describes how elementary school teachers demonstrated for themselves and their students how using simple drawings and visualization can improve problem-solving ability. (ASK)

Presents the 10 educational facility award winners of the Impact on Learning Award for 1999 and explains the ways they demonstrate how real-world problems can be solved with innovative design. The design challenge facing each facility and a critique of how it was met accompanies each entry. (GR)

Investigates a theoretical model of adolescent stress and coping using path analysis, with social support and social problem solving proposed as moderators. Results indicate that the effects of stressful events on adjustment were mediated by coping resources, which included a combination of problem-solving abilities and social support. Concludes…

States that there was convergence in counselors' and clients' reports of important session events. Found that convergence of important session therapeutic events increased linearly over time, and that increasing convergence was related to counseling outcomes, as measured by a decrease in interpersonal problems. Concludes that a match in important…

Managers (n=112) from a large international consumer goods manufacturer participated in a field experiment in which they learned and applied the Simplex process of creative thinking to solve real management problems. Behavioral skill in generating quantity of options was the most important variable to the creative process. (Contains references.)…

Considers a general problem of combining the classifications or predictions of local information systems into a single system. Introduces a new approach for solving an aggregation problem where a decision maker needs to classify an observation based on group-membership predictions coming from multiple experts, and describes results from empirical…

Makes a case for presenting humanistic mathematics and science to elementary school children. Introduces a theoretical yet practical framework for teaching these subjects in K-6 classrooms. Describes components of the humanistic curriculum: interactive/collaborative, holistic/relevant, interdisciplinary, and problem-based. (Contains 43…

Joins an affective system of representation with several cognitive representational systems to try to construct a realistic model for problem solving competence. Discusses two major affective pathways, one favorable and one unfavorable, together with conjectured relationships between affective states and useful or counterproductive heuristic…

Learners' choices of problem solving tools and techniques are influenced by the context in which the problem is encountered, and methods utilized in one context may not be recognized as natural ways to proceed in another. Explores the process of fostering learner-initiated applications of technology to address the wide range of problems outside of…

Proposes activity theory as a framework for student project work that is a form of open-ended contextual activity-based learning emphasizing problem solving as a collaborative effort. Topics include project work from a Vygotskian perspective of activity theory; and the design of a prototype for Web-based project work. (LRW)

Studies two intact classes of 30 undergraduate students enrolled in a mathematics course; however, one group received relaxation training during an initial class meeting and during the first 5-7 minutes of each subsequent class. The group which received the relaxation training had significantly lower mathematics anxiety and significantly higher…

Reports on a mathematical investigation of fractals and highlights the thinking involved, problem solving strategies used, generalizing skills required, the role of technology, and the role of mathematics. (ASK)

Presents the results of a study that aimed to incorporate a wide range of problem posing situations into students' problem solving in a classroom project with mathematically-able students in the first two years of secondary school. (Contains 15 references.) (ASK)

Analyzed the role of explanations students provide themselves (self-explanation) in solving word problems. Results from six female ninth graders show how students' categorical self-explanations mediate their transfer from the sequential representation of the problem to the tabular one. (SLD)

Examined the effect of perceived problem-solving ability among teacher trainees (N=60) operationalized by the Problem Solving Inventory (PSI) and random feedback (success vs. failure) on participants' attributions. Results indicate a significant PSI x Feedback interaction for ability and effort but not for task difficulty and luck. (RJM)