At Pumicestone State School all students are explicitly taught problem solving strategies.
The Beyond the Middle (BTM) program is used across the school from Year 1 through to Year 6. Proficiency in problem solving links directly with the core content being delivered through the Australian Curriculum. It is a lifelong skill that develops through integration of ten key problem solving strategies. The BTM program has a strong foundation in multi-step questioning providing our students and teachers a common metalanguage to analyse and apply problem solving strategies.
The Ten Strategic Problem Solving Strategies:
Our multistep problem solving program must ensure that the ten strategies of our BTM system are implemented in a sequential and explicit approach.
The ten strategies in order of delivery:
Students often use a problem solving mat (PDF, 130KB) help them think through the problem.