Developing An Engineering Identity In Early Childhood

Pantoya, Michelle L.; Aguirre-Muñoz, Zenaida; Hunt, Emily M.

doi:10.19030/ajee.v6i2.9502

Cited by 31 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Finally, teaching engineering also includes helping students see themselves as engineers. Studies have shown that helping students identify as engineers increased their views of who can be engineers (Capobianco et al, 2011;Pantoya, Aguirre-Munoz, & Hunt, 2015). Furthermore, in a first-year engineering program, Lindsay, Munt, Rogers, Scott, and Sullivan (2008) purposefully designated and treated their students as "student engineers" rather than "engineering students" to help them gain the skills of practicing engineers.…”

Section: Teaching Engineeringmentioning

confidence: 99%

Engineering as the integrator: A case study of one middle school science teacher's talk

Johnston

Akarsu

Moore

et al. 2019

J of Engineering Edu

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Background Integration of engineering into middle school science and mathematics classrooms is a key aspect of STEM integration. However, successful pedagogies for teachers to use engineering talk in their classrooms are not fully understood. Purpose/Hypothesis This study aims to address this need with the research question: How does a middle school life science teacher use engineering talk during an engineering design‐based STEM integration unit? Design/Method This case study examined the talk of a teacher whose students demonstrated high levels of learning in science and engineering throughout a three‐year professional development program. Transcripts of whole‐class verbal interactions for 18 class periods in the life science‐based STEM integration unit were analyzed using a theoretical framework based on the Framework for Quality K‐12 Engineering Education. Results The teacher used talk to integrate engineering in a variety of ways, skillfully weaving engineering throughout the unit. He framed lessons around problem scoping, incorporated engineering ideas into scientific verbal interactions, and aligned individual lessons and the overall unit with the engineering design process. He stayed true to the context of the engineering challenge and treated the students as young engineers. Conclusions This teacher's talk helped to integrate engineering with the science and mathematics content of the unit and modeled the practices of informed designers to help students learn engineering in the context of their science classroom. These findings have the potential to improve how educators and curricula developers utilize engineering teacher talk to support STEM integration.

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Section: Teaching Engineeringmentioning

confidence: 99%

Engineering as the integrator: A case study of one middle school science teacher's talk

Johnston

Akarsu

Moore

et al. 2019

J of Engineering Edu

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…However, such experiences are not uncommon in early childhood research. While there is a consensus among pre-primary researchers that children come to school with sufficient knowledge about the natural world (Pantoya, Aguirre-Munoz, and Hunt, 2015;Shonkoff and Phillips, 2000), can abstractly and concretely think (IOM and NRC, 2015), but the early technology and engineering realms are less understood and taught (National Association for the Education of Young Children [NAEYC] and Fred Rogers Center for Early Learning and Children's Media, 2012;Pantoya et al, 2015). This may be due to misconceptions among many pre-primary stakeholders that engineering and technology as subjects at pre-primary levelmeans using digital and/or electronic technology, such as touch-screen tablets and construction of block buildings and bridges in a classroom.…”

Section: Teachers' Experiences In Teaching and Learning Of Stem At Prmentioning

confidence: 99%

STEM starts early: Views and beliefs of early childhood education stakeholders in Tanzania

Ndijuye

Basil

2020

J Child Edu Soc

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For about a decade, Tanzania has intensely focused on developing literacy and numeracy skills in pre-primary and early grades programs. Recently, the attention has shifted towards the significance of teaching Science, Mathematics, Technology and Science (STEM) in the early years. To enhance the 21st century skills necessary for building a middle income and knowledge-based economies, the existing empirical evidence emphasizes the need for STEM education starting from pre-primary level. This paper aims to unpack the state of the STEM education in pre-primary education in Tanzania. By using homogenous purposive sampling, two policy-makers, three ECE academics, eight school principals, and eight pre-primary teachers from rural and urban public schools were recruited. Data were collected by interviews, semi-structured survey questionnaires, and documentary analyses. Though there was consensus among ECE stakeholders that children should be exposed to STEM environments as early as possible, findings indicated that even among ECE practitioners, there is a very vague understanding of what entails of STEM education in ECE. Further, while teachers were aware and guided to facilitate science and mathematics education, they were not aware and there were no specific policy briefs/circular instructions on how to facilitate Technology and Engineering education in ECE. The paper concludes with suggestions on how to integrate STEM in early childhood education, especially for Tanzania.

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“…Positive shifts in interest have been observed internationally when incorporating engineering projects into secondary schools (Malone, Schuchardt and Schunn, 2018) and informal outreach programs to K12 schools (Johnson et al, 2013;Karp and Maloney, 2013;Shahali et al, 2017). The incorporation of engineering at the early elementary school level (students five to 10 years old) has included the use of engineering picture and trade books to introduce engineering challenges (Milto et al, 2016;Pantoya et al, 2015), engineering design projects (Lachapelle and Cunningham, 2014;Silver and Rushton, 2008b), and animated videos (Johnson et al, 2013). The lack of inclination to become an engineer may be caused by the negative stereotypical images held by students rather than enjoyment of science and engineering (Silver and Rushton, 2008a;Wang and Degol, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Engineering Design Challenges in Early Childhood Education: Effects on Student Cognition and Interest

Malone

Tiarani

Irving

et al. 2018

European Journal of STEM Education

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This mixed methods study is one of the first to evaluate the effects of the incorporation of dramatic inquiry, dance, visual arts and physical education into preK-3 science, technology, engineering and mathematics units on student conceptual understanding of technology and engineering. The study used data collected from over 200 student surveys and focus group interviews with 14 teachers. The use of integrated STEAM units supported significant improvement in 4 to 8 year old students' understanding of engineering and technology. We report an average 55% increase in student understanding of what engineers do, and a 36% increase in their understanding of technology. The effect sizes for both assessments showed mostly large effects for all grade levels. The pre test scores across all grade levels were not significantly different. By implementing these integrated units with our younger students, we aimed to nurture their interest and understanding of engineering and technology across grade levels. This study results imply that students may not learn about these important topics outside of school hours; thus, it is important they become acquainted with these topics during school hours. Our work suggests that engineering units with dramatic inquiry should be introduced beginning in kindergarten.

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Developing An Engineering Identity In Early Childhood

Cited by 31 publications

References 14 publications

Engineering as the integrator: A case study of one middle school science teacher's talk

Engineering as the integrator: A case study of one middle school science teacher's talk

STEM starts early: Views and beliefs of early childhood education stakeholders in Tanzania

Engineering Design Challenges in Early Childhood Education: Effects on Student Cognition and Interest

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