Teachers’ Incorporation of Argumentation to Support Engineering Learning in STEM Integration Curricula

Abstract

One of the fundamental practices identified in Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) is argumentation, which has been researched in P-12 science education for the previous two decades but has yet to be studied within the context of P-12 engineering education. This research explores how elementary and middle school science teachers incorporated argumentation into engineering design-based STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) integration curricular units they developed during a professional development program. To gain a better understanding of how teachers included argumentation in their curricula, a multiple case study approach was conducted using four STEM integration units. While evidence of argumentation was found in each curriculum, the degree to which it appeared in each case varied. The strongest potential for argumentation occurred when students were required to explain and justify their final engineering design solutions to the client; certain guiding questions and discussions also promoted argumentation, depending on their structure. Additionally, argumentation was found to support engineering concepts such as the process of design, engineering thinking, communication in engineering contexts, and the application of science, mathematics, and engineering content. These findings support the idea that argumentation can be integrated into P-12 engineering education contexts in order to support students' STEM learning.

Supporting Engineering Design Ideas with Science and Mathematics: A Case Study of Middle School Life Science Students

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Integrating engineering in K-12 science education: spelling out the pedagogical, epistemological, and methodological arguments

“…Collectively, the studies on student design processes argue that problem scoping and information gathering are major challenges for students (Crismond & Adams, 2012). Hence, studies of curriculum and classroom environment (Mathis, Siverling, Glancy, & Moore, 2017;Nathan, Atwood, Prevost, Phelps, & Tran, 2011) in association with the amount of time spent in each aspect of the design process is essential (Mentzer et al, 2015). Here, a critical learning outcome is students' understanding of informed design practices and abilities to become better designers over time.…”

“…Novel Engineering promotes problem scoping by engaging students in determining the needs of characters in books and novels, understanding and articulating the problem context and developing design criteria and constraints. There are also integrated STEM units that emphasize clients and users (Mathis, Siverling, Glancy & Moore, 2017;Cook, Bush, & Cox, 2015) and engage students with stakeholders. In a middle school design project, Goldstein et al (2017) have collaborated with a local homebuilder aiming to design a sustainable neighborhood.…”

Argumentation in K-12 Mathematics and Science Education: A Content Analysis of Articles

“…In the field of science education, argumentation can lead not only to the learning and the advancement of science but also to the creation of argumentative skills (Martins & Justi, 2019). Argumentation is also a central component of the scientific process (Mathis et al, 2017) and an essential competency for science literacy (Lin & Hung, 2016). In addition, argumentation has played an essential role in the curriculum to develop scientific and critical thinking of 52 students, with an increasing number of publications over the past three decades, focused on analyzing the argumentative discourse in the context of science learning (Henderson et al, 2018;Jiménez-Aleixandre & Erduran, 2008).…”