This study explores young children's abstraction of the rules underlying a robot's emergent behavior. The study was conducted individually with six kindergarten children, along five sessions that included description and construction tasks, ordered by increasing difficulty. We developed and used a robotic control interface, structured as…

This study investigates young children's perspectives in explaining a self-regulating mobile robot, as they learn to program its behaviors from rules. We explore their descriptions of a robot in action to determine the nature of their explanatory frameworks: psychological or technological. We have also studied the role of an adult's intervention…

The main goals of this study were to look after the technological knowledge construction process by high-school high-achievers, and their ability to design and implement solutions for technological problems. More specifically, we examine the contribution of Project-based-learning (PBL), as pedagogical means for supporting the students' knowledge…

The study aimed to examine the relationship between alternative approaches towards problem solving/design teaching (structural or functional), students' mental modeling of the design process, and the quality of their solutions to design tasks. The "structural" approach emphasizes the need for an ordered and systematic learning of the design…

The ability to explore unknown spaces independently, safely and efficiently is a combined product of motor, sensory, and cognitive skills. Normal exercise of this ability directly affects an individual?s quality of life. Mental mapping of spaces and of the possible paths for navigating these spaces is essential for the development of efficient…

Discussion of technological problem-solving skills focuses on a study of Israeli seventh graders' work while engaged in design tasks within an unstructured learning environment. Reports on the evaluation/modification cycles, including conceptual constituents of the cycles; students' decisions regarding the original design goals; and the…

Describes an interactive technology-based system designed to support special education teachers' problem-solving training for promoting interventional planning. Utilizing the advantages of the expert-system technology in teacher training, the five training stages from case description to intervention planning and evaluation are presented. A sample…