Fostering Elementary Students’ Problem-Solving Skills and Scientific Mindset through Engineering Design: Evidence from a Rural STEM Camp in Thailand

Despite growing emphasis on STEM education globally, rural regions in developing countries continue to face persistent equity gaps in science learning opportunities. Science camps offer promising yet underexplored approaches to enhance STEM competencies in resource-constrained settings. This pilot study examined effects of a short-term, intensive STEM-based science camp on enhancing problem-solving skills and scientific mindset among elementary students in resource-constrained context. Using a one-group pretest - post-test design, 30 sixth-grade students from a border school in Nakhon Phanom Province, Thailand, participated in a two-day intervention structured around the Engineering Design Process (EDP). The science camp featured three integrated hands-on stations: Wind-Powered Vehicle Design, Solar System Modelling, and Boat Buoyancy Challenge. Problem-solving skills were measured pre- and post-intervention using a 12-item validated test. Scientific mindset was assessed post-intervention using a 14-item scale. Analyses included dependent t-test with effect sizes and thematic analysis of observations. Result from the Problem-solving Ability Test indicated statistically significant improvement from pretest (M=5.50, SD=1.68) to post-test (M=8.07, SD=2.15), t(29)=7.048, p<.01, d=1.33, representing a large effect. Improvements occurred across all dimensions: problem identification, analysis, solution generation, and evaluation. Students demonstrated high scientific mindset levels (M=51.83/70, 74%), with consistent gains observed across problem identification, analysis, solution generation, and evaluation dimensions. Qualitative thematic analysis further revealed that the EDP framework provided a critical scaffold for “productive struggle,” enabling students to engage in collaborative iteration and view failure as a learning opportunity. These findings suggest that well-designed, STEM camps can serve as effective, scalable models for mitigating educational peripheralization in underserved rural communities.