The integration of dilemmas stories with STEM-project-based learning: Analyzing students’ thinking skills using Hess’ cognitive rigor matrix

This study aimed to analyze students’ thinking skills through integrating dilemmas stories with a Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) project in polymers topic. The participants were 47 Grade 12 students from a public senior high school in West Java Province. The research employed a qualitative method to obtain data through classroom observations, reflective journals, interviews, and a concept test. Students’ thinking skills were assessed using Hess’ Cognitive Rigor Matrix, which combines Bloom's taxonomic and Webb's depth of knowledge. The results show that most students reach level C2 of Bloom's taxonomy and level 1 of Webb’s depth of knowledge, meaning that most students understand and recall the information. The results indicate that integrating dilemmas stories with STEM-PjBL enables students to explain using simple sentences and prior knowledge. In addition, this approach provides an opportunity for students to develop their critical thinking, creativity, and argumentation skills through problem-solving and project making.

Constructing Goals for Student Learning through Conversation

Learning goals differ from performance goals. We elaborate on their function and importance as the guiding force behind maintaining cognitive rigor during mathematics learning.

Elementary Preservice Teachers and Questioning Strategies in Mathematics

Research has demonstrated an interest in the relationship between teachers’ questioning strategies and children’s ability to reason and learn (Baroody & Ginsburg, 1990; Buschman, 2001; Fennema, Franke, Carpenter & Carey, 1993). Helping preservice teachers develop effective questioning strategies is an important component of a teacher education program. This session describes an exploration designed to determine if EC-6 preservice teachers can (a) recognize effective questioning strategies when observing inservice teachers and (b) use Hess’s Cognitive Rigor Matrix to analyze the level and effectiveness of their own questioning strategies during field experiences.

A Tool for Rethinking Teachers' Questioning

The Cognitive Rigor Matrix is a tool that teachers can use to analyze and reflect on questions and tasks and, in the process, increase the level of rigor.

“A Slow Revolution”: Toward a Theory of Intellectual Playfulness in High School Classrooms

In this essay, Sarah M. Fine explores the misalignment between instructional practices in secondary classrooms and the interests and capabilities of adolescent learners. Drawing on a series of ethnographic cases, she explores the potential consequences of this misalignment and attempts to conceptualize an alternate reality in which high school classrooms could become places where cognitive rigor and deep engagement function as mutually supportive priorities. Fine theorizes that a promising path forward would be pursuing instruction that involves intellectual playfulness—a construct that marries open-ended problem solving with opportunities for risk taking and flow. These same cases, however, illustrate that this pursuit would require profound transformations in the policies, practices, and perspectives that currently dominate the field.