Action Research to Improve Students’ Problem-Solving Skills using Social Cognitive Theory and Problem based Learning Strategies

Abstract

The main aim of this action research is to improve the student's technical problem-solving skill to fix and manage different technical problems in higher education Institutes. One of the main reasons for the deterioration of higher education institutions in providing the labour market with qualified professional cadres is keeping academic curricula in the classical frameworks and not develop the curricula to coincide with the technical progress. Solving technical problems has become an urgent need of the majority of the commercial companies, due to the expanded use of computer technologies and networks, for example, a single technical problem that disrupted the work for an hour may cost the businesses hundreds of millions of pounds. The implementation of this action research done in two different stages, the first and second stage to implement during the study and the third stage will perform in the future. The first stage strategy to achieve the Social Cognitive Theory (SCT), The second stage to implement the Problem Based Learning (PBL) using Guided practice strategies. Simple questioners were given to the learners, before and after the formative or summative assignments or the class problems solving activities. The results of questionnaires were analyzed in detail to determine the actual impact of different strategies applied to enhance problem-solving skills. In this research, we have been able to reach satisfactory results to improve the level of students in technical problem-solving skills this required significant efforts and times using PBL, Guided practice tutorials to help the learners mastering the problemsolving techniques. Because of the time limitation of this action research, the third stage of using PBL with application strategy to reduce the amount of the efforts and times will be implemented in future research.

Best practices for teaching the concept of the derivative: Lessons from experienced calculus instructors

“…In their investigation of students' thinking about the relationship between a function and its derivatives in a geometric context, Berry and Nyman (2003) found that the use of two educational technologies (a TI-83plus graphing calculator and a calculator based ranger) was helpful in supporting students' understanding of the aforementioned relationship. This finding is consistent with that of Hiyam et al (2019) who used Mathematica, a computerized algebra system, to develop students' ability to make connections between graphs of functions and graphs of the functions' derivatives, among other things. Sari et al (2018) reported on a teaching experiment that used GeoGebra, a dynamic mathematics software, to enhance students' ability to visualize the concept of the derivative.…”

“…A number of studies have reported promising results related to the integration of technology in the teaching of derivatives in calculus (cf. Berry & Nyman, 2003;Haciomeroglu & Andreasen, 2013;Hiyam et al, 2019;Rosly et al, 2020;Sari et al, 2018;Tall et al, 2008). Other educational technologies that have been used successfully in other studies to enhance students' learning about various calculus ideas including the derivative include MATLAB, Maple, and WolframAlpha, graphing calculators (cf.…”

“…Several studies have reported promising results related to the integration of technology in the teaching of derivatives in calculus (cf. Berry & Nyman, 2003;Borji et al, 2018;Haciomeroglu & Andreasen, 2013;Hiyam et al, 2019;Illanes et al, 2022;Rosly et al, 2020;Sari et al, 2018;Tall et al, 2008). In their investigation of students' thinking about the relationship between a function and its derivatives in a geometric context, Berry and Nyman (2003) found that the use of two educational technologies (a TI-83plus graphing calculator and a calculator based ranger) was helpful in supporting students' understanding of the aforementioned relationship.…”

“…Several other studies were cited before that provide detailed accounts of how to use other learning technologies such as Mathematica to support students' learning about the concept of the derivative (cf. Hiyam et al, 2019). Second, inter-rater reliability was not assessed, something that could have further strengthened the validity of the questionnaire used in the study.…”

Factorization Algorithm for Semi-primes and the Cryptanalysis of Rivest-Shamir-Adleman (RSA) Cryptography

“…All the semi-primes with 16 digits and below can be factorized in just a matter of seconds using powerful online mathematical software such as Wolfram|Alpha [14][15]. This is independent of the in-built factorization algorithm that this software already uses.…”