This presentation documents the third year of a STEM Problem Based Learning (PBL) project carried out at Skipper Clement Skolen which aims to complement the traditional didactic-learning based international curriculum offered to ninth and tenth grade students.

Students study the Cambridge CIE Coordinated Sciences where both knowledge and understanding and skills based learning are built-up via theory and exposure to the scientific method. Students carry out standard experiments and problem-solve in groups to a limited extent via setting up and using equipment to collect data. As Skipper Clement students live in Denmark and many go to Danish gymnasiums and universities, the STEM teachers strongly support the inclusion of PBL, and this is the third year of the partnership with the AAU LabSTEM Nord project.

Using the scientific method with enquiry based learning or PBL, termed STEMification by Hansen (2023), the students’ project development process was scaffolded into short steps each taking around 10 to 15 minutes. This contrasts previous years where the full process was presented before students began to develop their projects, leading to confusion implementing the steps. The terminology “think-pair-share” was used extensively to to encourage individual thinking before moving to pair and finally group brainstorming. The high level of scaffolding enabled students to stay on task as they could focus on one step in the methodology at a time. As the students progressed from planning to implementation there was less whole-class teacher intervention and more interaction between teachers and the individual groups. Three of the five groups of randomly selected students were able to work in a focussed and cooperative manner as evaluated by themselves and the five teachers involved in the sessions. The other groups reported positive learning outcomes as regards learning PBL skills but struggled to develop their projects in a systematic manner. Teachers were positive about the three month process involving 17 40-minute lessons, five teachers across 5 STEM subjects and in which the final outcome was presentations by the groups to the 8th grade students. Students and teachers evaluated the need this year for a broader problem remit albeit still focused on solving STEM problems at the school.

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Hansen, S. (2023, October 12). STEMification of teaching in science and mathematics (in S10). Aalborg, Denmark.