PROBLEM STRUCTURING METHODS

Problem Structuring Methods

Problem Structuring Methods

Introduction

Problem structuring is an essential system of direction or guiding means which have an effect on the achievement of all other stages of analysis. It is probably the most important activity performed by policy analysts. Wicked problem is an expression employed in social planning to explain a problem which is impossible or difficult to resolve due to contradictory, changing and incomplete provisions which are frequently hard to be identified.

Discussion

Problems are not discrete mechanical entities; they are purposeful (teleological) systems in which:

all possible subgroups of members have a non-independent effect on the system as a whole

no two members are identical in all or even any of their properties or behaviors

the possessions and performance of every associate, also method everyone influences the organization altogether, rely on behavior and properties of one other associate of the system as a minimum

[Priority of problem structuring]

Three Classes of Policy Problems

There are 03 sets of problems: moderately structured, well-structured, and ill-structured. The organization of all 03 is determined by the relative complexity of a problem. The distinctions among moderately structured, well-structured, and ill-structured problems are best illustrated by considering variations in their common elements. (Ackoff 2004, 25)

Well-structured, Moderately structured and Ill-structured problems

Even where word problems are followed by question marks, structuring a problem is not a matter of simple reading. Rather, a problem structurition must arise in the students' minds once they sort out the given and unknown information and the relationships among them. Because the problem structurition endows the solution process with awareness and clear goals, absence of the need or the ability to structure the problem is most likely to result in failing attempts to solve word problems. Research on the way students approach word problems reveals a significant deficiency of both—need and ability.

Many students process word problems without a logically determined procedure. This behavior is very common in the way primary school students solve problems in general. It may also be true of many middle school students. The fact that this behavior “lingers on” with some high school students who are fully capable of acting logically outside the mathematics context, with full awareness and retrospection, shows that their failing operation with word problems is not a function of true cognitive ability. It may well be, again, a product of the common classroom culture.

Students perceive the act of asking questions of the teacher in the classroom as an indicator of ignorance that should be hidden. They do not reflect upon what they do not know and usually ask questions only for which the answers are explicitly mentioned in the text. Consequently, even when students attempt to solve word problems, they take the structurition that is literally provided without any attempt to interpret it and work aimlessly toward “correct answers.” Teaching students to structure problems well before they attempt to solve them may be the most important component of inquiry-based learning and the first ingredient of an assessment of student understanding. The quality of solution attempts can always be ...