In today’s world, the ability to solve complex, real-world problems is not a nice-to-have—it’s essential.
At The Core Collaborative, we see problem-solving as the relentless pursuit of identifying, analyzing, and addressing challenges through inquiry, evidence-based strategies, collaboration, and innovative thinking. It is the practice of empowering educators, leaders, and students to view obstacles as opportunities for growth, fostering a culture of curiosity, critical thinking, and continuous learning. By embracing problem-solving as a core value, we cultivate resilient learning communities that thrive on collective efficacy, data-driven decision-making, and actionable solutions that advance equity and impact.
At schools like the New Technology High School in Napa, we focus not only on core academic content but also on cultivating essential skill sets that prepare students for life beyond the classroom. As part of our Schoolwide Learning Outcomes, we explicitly teach and assess capacities such as agency, collaboration, and problem-solving. These outcomes guide our project-based approach and ensure that learning is both rigorous and relevant. In our classrooms, students aren’t just gaining knowledge—they’re learning to apply it with purpose, adapt to challenges, and take ownership of their growth.
While projects provide meaningful contexts for this kind of learning, it’s the daily instructional routines—those intentional, consistent practices—that build the foundation for problem solving to thrive. This blog explores how the Re-Envisioning Rigor Series offers a pathway to embed those routines into everyday instruction, ensuring that problem solving becomes not just a goal of a project, but a habit of mind
Problem Solving Starts with Daily Practice
At its core, Re-Envisioning Rigor offers a clear response to a fundamental question:
How do we turn the big goals of PBL (and transfer learning) into meaningful learning every single day?
Project-Based Learning (PBL) sets the stage for powerful learning by engaging students as real-world problem solvers—thinkers who navigate complexity, collaborate effectively, and generate meaningful solutions. However, it’s the daily instructional routines within a project that build the confidence and depth students need to solve problems. Re-Envisioning Rigor bridges the big goals of PBL with the everyday moves that make them possible, offering practical, research-based routines that guide students to build knowledge, analyze complex issues, and apply their learning in real-world contexts. From inquiry to reflection, these routines give structure to student thinking and ensure that problem solving becomes a daily habit, not just the outcome of a project.
Building Blocks for Problem Solving: Surface, Deep, and Transfer
Equal intensity in a class or a lesson should leverage routines across the three phases of learning—each interconnected in the development of capable problem solvers:
- Surface-Level Routines give students access to foundational knowledge and academic language, essential for understanding the context of a problem. These routines build readiness, especially for multilingual learners, and ensure every student starts with the tools they need to contribute meaningfully.
- Deep-Level Routines cultivate analysis, reasoning, and critical thinking. Students learn to identify root causes, consider perspectives, and challenge assumptions. These are the muscles of problem solving—built through discourse, evidence use, and conceptual connections.
- Transfer-Level Routines guide students to apply their learning beyond the classroom. Whether presenting to authentic audiences, designing solutions, or reflecting on impact, students practice what it means to be a real-world problem solver—not just in theory, but in action.
Dispositions That Fuel Problem-Solving
Re-Envisioning Rigor nurtures the dispositions that make lifelong problem solving possible. The routines foster:
- Curiosity and inquiry
- Ownership of learning
- Persistence through challenge
- Reflection and self-direction
These aren’t add-ons—they’re embedded in daily instruction, helping students not only think critically, but also learn how to learn.
This ability—to learn how to learn—is a core capacity for solving problems that don’t yet have clear answers. The dispositional routines highlighted in the Re-Envisioning Rigor Series cultivate this capacity.
For example:
- Comparing Work Samples encourages students to analyze quality and criteria, deepening their understanding of what success looks like and advancing their ownership of learning.
- Know/Need to Know Lists prompts learners to monitor their understanding and generate purposeful questions, nurturing curiosity and planning.
- Compass Points helps students navigate decisions and emotional reactions during a project, fostering persistence and self-awareness.
- To & Through reinforces reflection by encouraging learners to articulate their progress and engage in self-directed learning as they work toward their goals.
These dispositional routines don’t just support doing the work—they support students in thinking about their thinking, becoming aware of their learning processes, and taking control of their academic journey. In doing so, they develop the metacognitive habits and learner identity that fuel adaptive expertise and sustained, self-directed problem solving beyond the classroom.
Re-Envisioning Rigor: A Tool for Realizing the Promise
Ultimately, developing problem solvers isn’t about a one-time project or a one-size-fits-all strategy. It’s about embedding the right moves, mindsets, and moments into the fabric of everyday instruction. Re-Envisioning Rigor delivers on that promise by offering:
- Daily instructional routines that lead to deeper thinking
- Structures that promote equity and engagement for all students
- A practical pathway for making PBL sustainable and student-centered
- Tools for helping students think critically, act purposefully, and reflect deeply
If we want to prepare students for a world that is increasingly complex, unpredictable, and interconnected, we must do more than deliver content—we must cultivate thinkers, innovators, and doers. The future demands learners who can navigate ambiguity, think critically across disciplines, collaborate across differences, and act with empathy and purpose. It demands problem solvers. By embedding intentional, responsive practices into everyday learning, we help students build not only academic strength but also the confidence, adaptability, and agency to shape a better future for themselves and the world around them. This is the promise of education. This is the power of developing problem solvers.
