Problem-based learning for enhancing students’ creative problem-solving abilities: Two cases of higher education in Singapore and South Korea

The advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution era calls for a new paradigm of human
resource development, bringing new business models and labor market variability. In higher
education, new efforts are being actively made to nurture talented people who can
successfully adapt to the Fourth Industrial Revolution era. Problem-Based Learning (PBL) is
a pedagogy that enhances learners’ creative problem-solving abilities, critical thinking
skills, and collaboration. The purpose of this study is to compare the cases of the
implementation of PBL practices in Singaporean and South Korean higher education
institutions and to examine their efforts at leveraging PBL pedagogy to nurture their students.
For this study, we used the official documents and secondary data of each institution,
together with the interviews of the school officials. As a result of the comparative analysis,
the goal of PBL pedagogy was the same for both institutions. However, the background of
the introduction of PBL, the way of conducting the class, the evaluation criteria of the learner,
and the difficulties for driving the PBL initiatives showed different results. Based on the
results of this comparative study, we also draw implications for educators and educational
administrators who want to apply PBL pedagogy to their curriculum.