Reflection On Current STEM Teaching
5 Current Strategies that Need To Change:
The lack of incorporating technology in STEM,
the lack of training for STEM teachers,
and disjointed curriculars.
Introducing STEM to preschoolers.
Outdated pedagogical in STEM teaching.
In order to become a responsive, creative teacher in STEM subjects, we need new training for preservice teachers that would allow for more room to experiment, fail, and try again. Any serial entrepreneur will tell you this is an essential part of the expectations required to find success in business. And I think it could be good for students to witness this, and give constructive feedback. This would create empathy and understanding for the teachers who work hard to help them; as well as reiterate the truth that learning is a never-ending journey.
I don’t think my understanding of constructivist epistemology has changed over time, but rather evolved throughout the course of my studies. Knowing an approach that would put learners at the forefront of their learning trajectory, to me, that is a revolution. These ideals have long been embraced in theory, by many in positions of influence over American pedagogical institutions. But the actual practice is still lacking in most schools that I am familiar with. And so, I believe it is fair to say that it is too early to make predictions about the likelihood of successful scaling to the numbers of students that the public educational system reaches.
In 2012, Schunk writes that “research exploring constructivist assumptions about learning is in its infancy” (p. 234), this means that there are rooms for more in-depth research on how could teachers best implement this pedagogy which Adom and his colleagues call “interpretivist paradigm of philosophy” aka constructivism paradigm in comparison to the “traditional philosophical paradigms” (p.1).
One thing that I did take away from my own experience, is that education has a huge impact on a person’s ontology and epistemology. This result reflects on a person’s level of cognitive information processing. In addition, this particular aspect of the constructivist paradigm matches with my teaching philosophy aimed at making children feel confident in their role as learners.
The need for well-trained teachers.
Reciprocally, the needs of our current generation of learners are also the needs of our current systems in training and or preparing teachers to serve our students in the 21st century. Here is the question that Linda Darling-Hammond (n.d) discussed during an interview, which I found very compelling: “Do you prepare teachers for schools as they are, or do you prepare them for schools as they need to become?” (as cited in Spector, 2019, para. 9). As thought-provoking as this is, I can’t argue this question from an either-or perspective. In the report of Department of the Interior Bureau of Education (1918): Cardinal Principles acknowledge that: “Society is always in process of development;...and the sciences on which educational theory and practice depend constantly furnish new information” (p. 7). I believe teachers in the 21st century must be trained to balance preparation for the immediately foreseeable future, not with in STEM teaching but also in all subjects. With the need to instill and nurture the confidence and independence that will allow our kids to build a better future that has yet-to-be fully anticipated
But the present moment is clear enough for me to confidently say that learning must become more innovative, creative, and personal. If the teacher simply passes knowledge to students by standing in front of the classroom and conducting a lesson without much excitement, the students will naturally be less engaged, regardless of their disposition towards the importance of learning. Thus, teaching new information requires effort to make it relatable to the students’ current and future selves.
Integrated STEM through game-based learning.
In my milieu, the current curricular STEM guidelines that we are teaching in the states of California are very compartmentalized and disconnected across STEM subjects. In recent research of Becker and Park (2011) explains that integrative approaches are “approaches that explore teaching and learning between any two or more of the STEM subject areas” (p.24). It is why that American students are not interested in STEM fields. So how can we design a STEM integrative approach that could potentially engage students' curiosity and interests?
Researchers have found that math is not integrated in STEM subjects. Hence, it is being proposed that combining math and other disciplines of STEM such as technology, and or engineering would be more effective in the promotion of STEM to students (Stohlmann, n.d). One of the three ways that math could be taught in the integration of technology is “through open-ended game-based learning” (Stohlmann, n.d, p.2239). Thus, the use of technology must be utilized as reorganizer of mental activity in order to shifts the focus on high order thinking in STEM instead of using technology as a tool to make projects that could have done by hand easier (Stohlmann, n.d).
How might you share what you learned in this course with other teacher colleagues?
I would personally broach this subject in the break room, and I would coordinate with my fellow teachers to take the idea to administration collectively. I would then suggest that we send out emails with explanatory information, and then conduct a poll on parents' receptivity to this idea.
References
Adom. D, Yeboah. A, Ankrah. A. (2016). Constructivism Philosophical Paradigm: Implication for Research, Teaching, And Learning. Global Journal of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences. Department of General Art Studies, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, University Post Office, Kumasi, Ghana. 4(10). http://www.eajournals.org/wp-content/uploads/Constructivism-Philosophical-Paradigm-Implication-for-Research-Teaching-and-Learning.pdf
Schunk, D. H. (2012). Learning theories: An educational perspective (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson
Spector, C. (2019, July 29). “If you don’t have a strong supply of well-prepared teachers, nothing else in education can work”. Stanford Graduate School of Education.
Department Of the Interior Bureau of Education (1918). Cardinal Principles of Secondary education. The Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Education appointed by the National Education Association. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED541063.pdf