Characterising the Literature on the Teaching and Learning of System Thinking and Complexity in STEM Education: a Bibliometric Analysis and Research Synthesis

Bielik, Tom; Delen, İbrahim; Krell, Moritz; Assaraf, Orit Ben Zvi

doi:10.1007/s41979-023-00087-9

Cited by 7 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 103 publications

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“…The aim of this research was to identify the existing limitations when working on environmental education in ECE, PE, and PTT classrooms from an environmental justice perspective. It has long been emphasised that environmental problems must be understood as a complex system [24] involving social, economic, environmental, ethical, and health factors [12,41]. Therefore, the latest 2030 Agenda strategy and the SDGs [42] call for an integrated approach to understanding environmental degradation and lifestyles.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These elements are interconnected and are systems thinking, critical literacy, and action competence. Systems thinking enables students to understand, explain, and interpret complex and dynamic problems in science classrooms in a holistic way [24]. To achieve this, it is crucial to identify the components of a system and their interrelationships [25].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Educational Practice in Education for Environmental Justice: A Systematic Review of the Literature

Guevara-Herrero,

Bravo-Torija,

Pérez-Martín

2024

Sustainability

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The environmental crisis makes it necessary to reconsider the practices of environmental education (EE) and guide them towards a transformative perspective to promote critical reflection and the ability to make decisions in the face of complex problems, including a perspective of justice. Using the PRISMA systematic review protocol, this article analysed 49 classroom intervention published on international journals to identify the limitations when working on EE in early childhood education, primary education, and pre-service teacher training classrooms from an environmental justice (EJ) perspective. Considering the variables “contents”, “depth of the interventions”, “actions required of students”, and “resources”, the results show a predominance of interventions that promote content knowledge from an ecological perspective and demand actions far removed from reflection and participation, using self-made materials. By not encouraging students to reflect on environmental issues in a holistic way to change their behaviour, it was confirmed that they move away from systems thinking, critical literacy, and action competence. Therefore, there is a lack of integration of the EJ perspective in classroom practices. To achieve educational success in terms of social change for environmental protection, it is necessary to promote research work focused on the didactics of EE including a social justice perspective.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Educational Practice in Education for Environmental Justice: A Systematic Review of the Literature

Guevara-Herrero,

Bravo-Torija,

Pérez-Martín

2024

Sustainability

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“…Because of the dynamic nature of the connection between the system's different levels of hierarchy, complex systems are difficult to understand, even for experts (Hmelo-Silver and Azevedo, 2006). Recent review studies indicate that there are only few studies on science teachers and systems thinking (York et al, 2019;Bielik et al, 2023). further, little is known about (preservice) teachers' abilities to appreciate complex phenomena-such as the COVID-19 pandemic-as systems.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using concept maps to evaluate preservice biology teachers’ conceptualization of COVID-19 as a complex phenomenon

Bielik,

Jagemann,

Krell

et al. 2023

Front. Educ.

Self Cite

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IntroductionThe COVID-19 pandemic showed the critical importance of supporting teachers’ and students’ systems thinking when making sense of complex phenomena. This study sets to explore preservice biology teachers’ (PBTs) mental models of COVID-19 as complex phenomenon using concept maps.Methods27 PBTs concept maps of COVID-19 outbreak were collected and taken for analysis. Structural and complexity attributes were identified in participants’ concept maps and the relationships between them were tested, providing statistical analyses using exemplary concept maps.ResultsThe results suggest that the appearance of many concepts in a map (structural attribute) does not necessarily indicate high level of complexity, but rather the amount of simple structural relationships (complexity attribute). On the other hand, the results indicate that higher structural sophistication (e.g., high number of connections and junctions) could be associated with the complexity level of the map.DiscussionThis study provides a practical method for evaluating the complexity level of PBTs’ systems thinking, suggests a possible link between structural and complexity attributes in their concept maps, and demonstrates the need to further support PBTs in developing their systems thinking skills in the context of complex biological phenomena.

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“…Key competencies in sustainability summarized as systemic thinking, interdisciplinary collaboration, and expertise-based action [ 13 , 14 ]. Systemic thinking is critical to understanding complex system properties, e.g., interactions between components, emerging phenomena, and network organization [ 15 ]. The systemic thinking-oriented teaching approach is structured by context-driven enquiry, supported by learning power, positioned at the interface of knowledge generation and use, and grounded in a commitment to sustainable development [ 16 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual sustainability competence development in engineering education: Community interaction open-source learning

Li,

Huang,

Yang

et al. 2023

PLoS ONE

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This empirical research creates and assesses a community interaction open-source learning framework. The framework established an efficient open-source learning environment for engineering courses to develop undergraduates’ sustainability competencies. The teaching practice of the framework was designed into three stages: course preparation, theory lecture, and project practice. In the teaching practice, community interaction elements were embedded, including community/student two-way selection, systemic teaching and difficulty discussion, expert/student negotiation on teaching forms, teacher/expert coordination on teaching contents, and expert/student two-way feedback on schedules. The interaction elements between students, teachers, and experts enhanced the effectiveness of open-source learning in engineering courses. The experimental results showed that the students exhibited a positive attitude and high participation in the learning procedure and reported a sense of achievement in the project practice. The open-source learning framework significantly improved systemic thinking, conceptual understanding, interdisciplinary collaboration and professional skills. It enhanced students’ key sustainability competencies and laid the foundation for them to become expertise-based innovators and open-source community contributors.

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Characterising the Literature on the Teaching and Learning of System Thinking and Complexity in STEM Education: a Bibliometric Analysis and Research Synthesis

Cited by 7 publications

References 103 publications

Educational Practice in Education for Environmental Justice: A Systematic Review of the Literature

Educational Practice in Education for Environmental Justice: A Systematic Review of the Literature

Using concept maps to evaluate preservice biology teachers’ conceptualization of COVID-19 as a complex phenomenon

Individual sustainability competence development in engineering education: Community interaction open-source learning

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