Why do some students struggle to apply what they memorise in class? Problem based learning addresses this gap by engaging students in real-world challenges that build critical thinking and practical understanding.
At The ABC International School (ABCIS), problem based learning is integrated into daily lessons, helping students develop independence, curiosity, and confidence.
This article explains problem based learning, its benefits, and how the ABCIS prepares students for real-world success.
Key Takeaways
- Problem-based learning begins with an ill-structured problem that students cannot yet solve. The gap in their knowledge is the engine of the lesson.
- It is not project-based learning. Problem-based learning ends in an explanation; project-based learning ends in a product.
- It was developed at McMaster University Medical School in 1969, because students could recite the science and could not diagnose the patient.
- The evidence is genuinely mixed, and in an instructive way: it does little for factual recall and a great deal for application and retention.
- A weak problem produces a weak lesson. The design of the problem is the whole of the method.
What Is Problem Based Learning?
Problem-based learning is an approach in which students are given a complex, ill-structured problem before they have been taught how to solve it. Working in small groups with a tutor, they identify what they already know, work out what they need to find out, research it independently, and return to explain the problem.
The critical word is before. In a conventional lesson, the teaching comes first and the problem is set afterwards to check that the teaching landed. Problem-based learning reverses this. The problem comes first, and the not-knowing is the point.
An ill-structured problem is one with no single obvious method, incomplete information, and more than one defensible answer. Real problems are like this. Textbook exercises are not.
Problem-Based Learning vs Project-Based Learning
These two are confused constantly, including by schools. Both are abbreviated PBL, which does not help. The distinction is real and it changes what happens in the room.
| Problem-based learning | Project-based learning | |
|---|---|---|
| Starts with | A problem the students cannot yet solve. | A driving question and a plan to build something. |
| Ends with | An explanation, a diagnosis, a recommendation. | A public product: a model, a film, a proposal. |
| Knowledge is | Acquired because the student hits a wall and needs it. | Applied in order to make the thing. |
| Came from | McMaster University Medical School, 1969. | Progressive education; Dewey and his successors. |
| Classic example | A patient presents with these symptoms. What is wrong, and how do you know? | Design and build a bridge, then exhibit it. |
| The engine is | Not knowing. | Making. |
A useful test: if a capable student could complete the task without ever discovering a gap in their knowledge, it is a project, not a problem.
Both are worth doing, and they do different jobs. We cover the other one in project-based learning.ncounter.
The Seven-Jump: How It Actually Runs
The most widely used procedure, developed at Maastricht, has seven steps. It is worth seeing in full, because it shows how much structure sits underneath what looks like open-ended discovery.
- Clarify terms. Agree what the words in the problem actually mean.
- Define the problem. State plainly what needs explaining.
- Brainstorm. Offer explanations from existing knowledge, without checking anything yet.
- Structure the explanations. Organise the guesses. Notice where they conflict.
- Formulate learning objectives. Decide, as a group, exactly what you do not know and must find out. This is the pivot of the whole method.
- Independent study. Go away and learn it. Alone. This is not group work.
- Report back and synthesise. Return, teach each other, and explain the problem properly.
Look at steps five and six. Problem-based learning is often assumed to be a collaborative free-for-all. In fact its core is a period of solitary, self-directed study, pointed at objectives the student worked out for themselves. The group exists to identify the gap. The student closes it alone.
This is closely related to student agency and to genuine research skills.
The Benefits of Problem Based Learning
Research consistently shows PBL delivers powerful outcomes. Students engaged in problem-solving retain information longer. They also develop stronger motivation to learn.
Academic Benefits
PBL improves academic performance across subjects. Students understand concepts more deeply when they apply them. Knowledge becomes useful rather than abstract.
Standardised test results often improve too. This surprises parents who worry PBL might reduce academic rigour. The opposite proves true in well-designed programmes.
Social and Emotional Benefits
Working through complex problems together builds strong relationships. Students learn to listen, negotiate, and compromise. They develop empathy by considering multiple perspectives.
“Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” – W.B. Yeats
This famous quote captures the spirit of PBL perfectly. Students become genuinely excited about learning.
Long-Term Career Advantages
Graduates of PBL programmes often excel in higher education. Universities increasingly use similar methods themselves. Students arrive already familiar with independent research and collaboration.
Professional success follows naturally. PBL graduates tend to adapt quickly to workplace demands. They bring creativity and leadership to their chosen fields.
Real Problem-Based Learning Examples
Most articles list projects here and call them problems. These are problems. Note that none of them asks the student to build anything, and none has a single correct answer at the outset.
- Science, Key Stage 3. A pond in a local park has lost its fish over six weeks. The water is clear. Here are the readings taken each week. What happened?
- Mathematics. A shop’s takings rose 20% and its profit fell. Both figures are correct. Explain how this is possible.
- History. Here are four contemporary accounts of the same event. They contradict one another. All four authors were present. Which do you believe, and on what grounds?
- Geography, local. This district of Ho Chi Minh City floods in the rainy season, and the district next to it, at the same elevation, does not. Why?
- Biology, sixth form. A patient presents with fatigue, weight loss, and a persistent thirst. Here is the blood work. What is your diagnosis and what would you test next to confirm it?
In each case the students do not know the answer, cannot look it up in a single place, and must decide what to learn before they can begin. That decision is the lesson.
What Makes a Good Problem
The method lives or dies on the quality of the problem. A weak problem produces a week of confusion. A good one has four properties.
- It is genuinely ill-structured. No obvious method, incomplete information, more than one defensible conclusion.
- It cannot be solved by looking it up. If the answer is the first result on a search engine, it is a comprehension exercise wearing a disguise.
- It sits just beyond what students know. Far enough to require new learning, close enough that they can get purchase on it.
- It rewards explanation, not decoration. The output is an argument. If it can be padded out with a nice poster, it will be.
How Is Problem-Based Learning Assessed?
This is the question parents ask, and it has a real answer.
The product of problem-based learning is an explanation, which means it is assessed like an argument: is the reasoning sound, is the evidence used properly, are the alternatives considered and dismissed for reasons? This can be marked rigorously, and it maps directly onto the higher mark bands of IGCSE and A Level, which reward exactly this.
Individual accountability matters here as much as anywhere. Because step six of the cycle is solitary study, each student can and should be assessed on what they brought back. Ask a school how it does this. The answer will tell you whether the method is being run properly or merely mentioned in a brochure.
How We Use Problem-Based Learning at the ABCIS
At The ABC International School (ABCIS), we teach the English National Curriculum, and we use problem-based approaches where they earn their place rather than everywhere.
- We use it to deepen, not to introduce. Students meet a topic through clear teaching, then meet a problem that shows them what they have not yet understood. The order matters, and getting it backwards is the most common way this method fails.
- The problems are local where possible. Flooding, air quality, and river ecology in Ho Chi Minh City are genuinely ill-structured, genuinely unsolved, and on the doorstep.
- Model United Nations is problem-based learning by another name. A delegate is handed a position, a conflict, and no solution, and must research their way to a defensible argument against people arguing back.
- House Teams and FOBISIA events. Dalat Dragons, Hanoi Hornets, Mekong Monsters and Saigon Serpents compete in challenges where the task is set and the method is not.
Small classes mean a teacher can sit with a group and hear the reasoning, which is the only way this method can be supervised honestly. We hold four consecutive BSO Outstanding inspection grades, most recently in January 2024, and are accredited by Cambridge International and AQA. Every year, over 95% of our graduates go on to study at universities across the world.
The Value of Not Knowing
Most schooling is arranged so that a child is never confused for long. Problem-based learning deliberately arranges the opposite, on the grounds that the moment before understanding is the moment learning happens.
It was invented because doctors who knew everything could not diagnose anything. That is a warning worth taking seriously, and it applies well beyond medicine.
Book a campus visit and ask to see a lesson where the students do not yet know the answer.
- Trung Son Campus: #152-158, Street No. 1, Trung Son, Binh Hung Commune, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
- Nha Be Campus: #2, Street No. 9, Tan An Huy, Nha Be Commune, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
- Phone: +84 (0)28 7308 1828
- Email: office@theabcis.com
Frequently Asked Questions
It is an approach in which students are given a complex problem before being taught how to solve it. Working in a small group, they establish what they know, identify what they need to find out, study that independently, and then return to explain the problem. The gap in their knowledge is what drives the learning.
Problem-based learning starts with a problem the students cannot yet solve and ends with an explanation. Project-based learning starts with a plan and ends with a product. In the first, knowledge is acquired because the student hits a wall; in the second, knowledge is applied in order to build the thing. A useful test is whether a capable student could complete the task without ever discovering a gap in what they know. If they could, it is a project rather than a problem.
From McMaster University Medical School in Canada, in 1969. Staff had observed that medical students could recite biochemistry and pharmacology in detail and then stand at a bedside unable to diagnose the patient in front of them. Howard Barrows and colleagues rebuilt the curriculum around patient cases, so that students encountered the problem first and discovered what they needed to learn by failing to explain it. The approach spread worldwide and remains dominant in medical education.
A pond has lost its fish over six weeks though the water is clear; here are the weekly readings, what happened? A shop’s takings rose by twenty per cent while its profit fell; both figures are correct, explain how. Four eyewitnesses to the same historical event contradict each other; which do you believe, and why? Note that none of these asks the student to build anything, and none has a single obvious answer at the outset. That is what separates a problem from a project.
The evidence is mixed in a specific and informative way. Students taught this way tend to do no better, and occasionally slightly worse, on tests of pure factual recall. They tend to do better on applying knowledge, reasoning through unfamiliar situations, and retaining what they learned over time. That is not a failure of the method; it is a description of what it optimises for. Knowledge learned because it was needed is harder to accumulate quickly and easier to retrieve later.
With care. Open problems can overwhelm novices who lack the background knowledge to get any purchase on them, and a floundering child is not a learning child. Problem-based learning works best as a way of deepening a subject rather than introducing one. Younger students need more structure, tighter problems, and a teacher close at hand.
The output is an explanation, so it is assessed as an argument: is the reasoning sound, is the evidence handled properly, have the alternatives been considered and rejected for stated reasons? This maps closely onto the higher mark bands at IGCSE and A Level. Because the independent study phase is solitary, individual contributions can and should be assessed separately, which is worth asking any school about.
