Introduction
My interest in problem solving as an area of study within mathematics education
began more than 40 years ago as I was beginning to think seriously about a topic for my
doctoral dissertation. Since that time, my interest in and enthusiasm for problem solving,
in particular problem-solving instruction, has not waned but some of my thinking about it
has changed considerably. In this article I share some of my current thinking about a
variety of ideas associated with this complex and elusive area of study, giving special
attention to problem-solving instruction. To be sure, in this article I will not provide
much elaboration on these ideas and careful readers may be put off by such a cursory
discussion. My hope is that some readers will be stimulated by my ideas to think a bit
differently about how mathematical problem solving, and in particular problem-solving