Ill-Structured Problems and the Value of Comparable Perspectives

Abstract

The pedagogical value of ill-structured problems in promoting learning has been widely discussed in the scholarly literature. Scholars have also proposed different strategies in developing students’ cognitive skills in solving ill-structured problems. This Reflection extends the discussion of these strategies by focusing on one specific method, that is, incorporating diverse and comparable scholarly perspectives in the syllabus. This Reflection further argues that that the presence of multiple scholarly perspectives can enhance students’ ability to make independent judgments, because these perspectives can be compared and contrasted. Due to the room for comparison and contrast, students can better understand the strengths and weaknesses of individual scholarly viewpoints, and more actively make use of them to articulate their thoughts on how to respond to the ill-structured issue. The evidence for this argument came from the focus group discussions of a two-year study on a foundational module in one of the honours colleges at the National University of Singapore (NUS).