NEW TOOL: Students should generate criteria and constraints for engineering design problems—not just be provided with them

Posted on December 11, 2019

The science and engineering practices become meaningful when students actively engage in them to address and manage uncertainties and make choices in the context of an investigation. In the context of engaging with an engineering design problem, this stance involves supporting students to develop and apply criteria and constraints—rather than simply providing them with all of those details as part of the instructional task. This new STEM Teaching Tool provides detailed guidance for how to engage students in the process of actively defining the criteria and constraints for engineering design problems they are working on—working from multiple perspectives and on multiple dimensions of the design space. This resource was co-authored by Kim Weaver, Gina Tesoriero, and Philip Bell.