An importantobjective in education generally, and tertiary education in particular, is the imparting of the ability to use acquired knowledge when solving problems. Both within tertiary education itself and in society, however, the complaint is frequently heard that it is precisely in this respect that the training of students is deficient.An alternative to conventional methods of teaching how to apply knowledge is to use explicitly problem-based teaching. Using a theoretical perspective derived from both an action-oriented and an information-processing perspective, it is shown that the problembased approach has more potential.Maximizing this potential requires cognizance of the various types of problem-based approach, whose variants depend on the problem, the extent of pre-structuring and the roles assigned to individuals in a group. Also important is the systemic position of problem-based teaching in a curriculum.