Curriculum

Engagement and Science Achievement in the Context of Integrated STEM Education: A Longitudinal Study

A growing number of studies have shown the benefits of K-12 integrated science and engineering education. With this study, we add to the literature by documenting the relationship between STEM learning and engagement, and the demographic characteristics that impact achievement in STEM. This longitudinal study followed a diverse group of 245 middle school students from sixth grade to eighth grade. Students in two cohorts, cohort I and cohort II, participated in three different integrated STEM units during middle school, one in each grade level.

Author/Presenter

S. Selcen Guzey

Weiling Li

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2022
Short Description

A growing number of studies have shown the benefits of K-12 integrated science and engineering education. With this study, we add to the literature by documenting the relationship between STEM learning and engagement, and the demographic characteristics that impact achievement in STEM.

Legitimation Code Theory as an Analytical Framework for Integrated STEM Curriculum and Its Enactment

Recent reform initiatives in STEM disciplines inspired the development and implementation of integrated STEM approaches to science teaching and learning. Integrated STEM as an approach to science teaching and learning leverages engineering principles and practices to situate learning in an authentic and meaningful science learning environment.

Author/Presenter

Chelsey A. Dankenbring

S. Selcen Guzey

Lynn A. Bryan

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2023
Short Description

In this paper, we describe Legitimation Code Theory as an analytical framework and provide an analysis of semantic patterns of an integrated STEM unit (written discourse) and a middle school teacher’s enactment of that unit (oral discourse). Specifically, this analysis focused on the semantic gravity (SG), or level of context dependency, of the activities and dialogue present throughout the unit.

Students Do Not Always Mean What We Think They Mean: A Questioning Strategy to Elicit the Reasoning Behind Unexpected Causal Patterns in Student System Models

An ability to engage in system thinking is necessary to understand complex problems. While many pre-college students use system modeling tools, there is limited evidence of student reasoning about causal relationships that interact in diverging and converging chains, and how these affect system behavior. A chemistry unit on gas phenomena was implemented in two successive years with 73 high school students. Although the phenomena could be explained with simple linear causal reasoning, many student models included surprising and problematic causal chains and non-linear patterns.

Author/Presenter

Steven Roderick

Namsoo Shin

Daniel Damelin

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2022
Short Description

An ability to engage in system thinking is necessary to understand complex problems. While many pre-college students use system modeling tools, there is limited evidence of student reasoning about causal relationships that interact in diverging and converging chains, and how these affect system behavior. A chemistry unit on gas phenomena was implemented in two successive years with 73 high school students. Although the phenomena could be explained with simple linear causal reasoning, many student models included surprising and problematic causal chains and non-linear patterns.

Students Do Not Always Mean What We Think They Mean: A Questioning Strategy to Elicit the Reasoning Behind Unexpected Causal Patterns in Student System Models

An ability to engage in system thinking is necessary to understand complex problems. While many pre-college students use system modeling tools, there is limited evidence of student reasoning about causal relationships that interact in diverging and converging chains, and how these affect system behavior. A chemistry unit on gas phenomena was implemented in two successive years with 73 high school students. Although the phenomena could be explained with simple linear causal reasoning, many student models included surprising and problematic causal chains and non-linear patterns.

Author/Presenter

Steven Roderick

Namsoo Shin

Daniel Damelin

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2022
Short Description

An ability to engage in system thinking is necessary to understand complex problems. While many pre-college students use system modeling tools, there is limited evidence of student reasoning about causal relationships that interact in diverging and converging chains, and how these affect system behavior. A chemistry unit on gas phenomena was implemented in two successive years with 73 high school students. Although the phenomena could be explained with simple linear causal reasoning, many student models included surprising and problematic causal chains and non-linear patterns.

Adapting Existing Curriculum for Equitable Learning Experiences

Despite the increased availability of curricular resources intended to support teachers to engage in equitable instruction as expected by the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS Lead States 2013), teachers are still left wondering how to use those generic resources in local classroom contexts that have unique challenges.

Author/Presenter

Nelly Tsai

Hosun Kang

Jasmine Chang

Karly Cassese

Year
2022
Short Description

In this article, we—a team of science teachers and a university researcher—present the processes of adapting existing curricular resources to promote equitable learning experiences for diverse learners. Using a middle school ecology unit as an example, we illustrate what the modification process looks like in two key elements of designing NGSS-aligned science instruction: (a) making phenomena matter with the consideration of student identities and (b) leveraging students’ diverse ideas and questions to drive instruction.

Uvvatuq Naluallangniaqtugut (I Humbly Hope We Run Into Game): An Iñupiaq Research Process

Uvvatuq naluallangniaqtugut (I humbly hope we run into game) is a phrase an Iñupiaq person would say before going out hunting in the Selawik dialect. We believe all things have a spirit, including animals. If a hunter announces they are going out hunting, the animal spirits will hear that and the hunter may have bad luck. Another phrase said in English is “I am going out for a ride.” The University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) was awarded a grant from the National Science Foundation.

Author/Presenter

Sean Asiqłuq Topkok

Hannah Paniyavluk Loon

Year
2021
Short Description

The University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) Development Team is working with the Northwest Arctic Borough School District to develop STEM lessons utilizing Iñupiaq knowledge systems and university research for middle school-age students in three villages. The UAF participating programs humbly reached out to local community members to establish a TRACKS Team. However, the UAF participating programs wanted the TRACKS Team to identify what is important to teach their children. The community were the ones to identify the research topic, utilizing an analogy Uvvatuq naluallangniaqtugut (I humbly hope we run into game) for an Iñupiaq research process.

Resource(s)

Understanding Students' Sense-Making Processes When Faced with Unexpected Data: A Case Study in High School Biology

Examining a lesson in a high school biology unit that utilized noisy sensor data, we sought to understand the ways students engaged in active reasoning about the data and the factors that influenced this process. Video analysis centers on one small group of students as they learn to use sensors to collect data on osmosis, focusing particularly on their reactions to variation within and across experimental runs.

Author/Presenter

Natalya St. Clair

Brandi Ediss

Lynn Stephens

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2021
Short Description

Examining a lesson in a high school biology unit that utilized noisy sensor data, we sought to understand the ways students engaged in active reasoning about the data and the factors that influenced this process. Video analysis centers on one small group of students as they learn to use sensors to collect data on osmosis, focusing particularly on their reactions to variation within and across experimental runs.

Eco-Solutioning: The Design and Evaluation of a Curricular Unit to Foster Students’ Creation of Solutions to Address Local Socio-Scientific Issues

The global pandemic and climate change have led to unprecedented environmental, social, and economic challenges with interdisciplinary STEM foundations. Even as STEM learning has never been more important, very few pre-college programs prepare students to address these challenges by emphasizing socio-scientific issue (SSI) problem solving and the engineering design of solutions to address local phenomena.

Author/Presenter

Nancy Butler Songer

Guillermo D. Ibarrola Recalde

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2021
Short Description

The global pandemic and climate change have led to unprecedented environmental, social, and economic challenges with interdisciplinary STEM foundations. Even as STEM learning has never been more important, very few pre-college programs prepare students to address these challenges by emphasizing socio-scientific issue (SSI) problem solving and the engineering design of solutions to address local phenomena. The paper discusses the design and evaluation of a pre-college, SSI curricular unit where students expand their learning by creating solutions to increase biodiversity within local urban neighborhoods.

"I Happen to Be One of 47.8%": Social-Emotional and Data Reasoning in Middle School Students' Comics about Friendship

Effective data literacy instruction requires that learners move beyond understanding statistics to being able to humanize data through a contextual understanding of argumentation and reasoning in the real-world. In this paper, we explore the implementation of a co-designed data comic unit about adolescent friendships. The 7th grade unit involved students analyzing data graphs about adolescent friendships and crafting comic narratives to convey perspectives on that data.

Author/Presenter

Ralph Vacca

Kayla Desportes

Marian Tes

Megan Silander

Camillia Matuk

Anna Amato

Peter J. Woods

Year
2022
Short Description

Effective data literacy instruction requires that learners move beyond understanding statistics to being able to humanize data through a contextual understanding of argumentation and reasoning in the real-world. In this paper, we explore the implementation of a co-designed data comic unit about adolescent friendships.

"I Happen to Be One of 47.8%": Social-Emotional and Data Reasoning in Middle School Students' Comics about Friendship

Effective data literacy instruction requires that learners move beyond understanding statistics to being able to humanize data through a contextual understanding of argumentation and reasoning in the real-world. In this paper, we explore the implementation of a co-designed data comic unit about adolescent friendships. The 7th grade unit involved students analyzing data graphs about adolescent friendships and crafting comic narratives to convey perspectives on that data.

Author/Presenter

Ralph Vacca

Kayla Desportes

Marian Tes

Megan Silander

Camillia Matuk

Anna Amato

Peter J. Woods

Year
2022
Short Description

Effective data literacy instruction requires that learners move beyond understanding statistics to being able to humanize data through a contextual understanding of argumentation and reasoning in the real-world. In this paper, we explore the implementation of a co-designed data comic unit about adolescent friendships.