The increasingly popular term 'problem-based learning' does not refer to a specific educational method. It can have many different meanings depending on the design of the educational method employed and the skills of the teacher. The many variables possible can produce wide variations in quality and in the educational objectives that can be achieved. A taxonomy is proposed to facilitate an awareness of these differences and to help teachers choose a problem-based learning method most appropriate for their students.

This chapter reviews the motivation for the change to problem‐based learning, its definition, and the educational objectives it can serve. It discusses changing an established curriculum to problem‐based learning and asks whether problem‐based learning is worth the trouble.

This paper describes an analysis of facilitation of a student-centered problem-based learning group. The focus of this analysis was to understand the goals and strategies of an expert facilitator in support of collaborative learning. This was accomplished through interaction analysis using video data and stimulated recall to examine two PBL group meetings. In this paper, we examine how specific strategies were used to support the PBL goals of helping students construct causal explanations, reason effectively, and become self-directed learners while maintaining a student-centered learning process. Being able to articulate these strategies is an important step in helping others learn the art of PBL facilitation.

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