1 Promising Practices in STEM Education Essay Outline Title: Use of Complex Problems in Teaching Physics

Brief Description of the promising practice, activity or project: Cooperative group problem solving is a generic instructional approach designed to scaffold complex tasks by using a cooperative framework among peers. The cooperative group framework is an important aspect of the practice and has a long history of learning success (Johnson and Johnson, 1989). Of the five key elements that separate cooperative groups from traditional groups, it is the Promotive Interaction element that warrants attention. Promotive Interaction reminds the teacher to structure the groups and provide the students with an appropriate task: a task that challenges the entire group. In physics, cooperative group problem-solving, as introduced by Patricia and Ken Heller ((Heller, Keith, and Anderson, 1992; Heller and Hollabaugh, 1992) relies on Context-rich problems as the appropriate task for the groups. Context-rich problems always begin by putting the student (you) into an everyday situation; preferably written as a short story, where physics provides an answer. The goal is to motivate interest in the problem by using physics in a plausible situation. In such a manner, the general principles of physics are quickly applied to a concrete scenario. As they encounter mor