Abstract:

In today’s current climate for schooling of our young people, there is a constant call for greater and more meaningful opportunities for students to engage in complex and creative thinking where connections are made among self, family, community, and the world around us (Kelley & Knowles, 2016). Research suggests that linking learning with personal relevance enjoys great benefits, not only with higher degrees of motivation and engagement, but adds to many 21st century skill sets where individuals have greater flexibility in their own thinking and can pivot from one way of representing a problem to another opening pathways for solution building (Chalkiadaki, 2018). One such pathway is to “engage students where disciplines converge” by encouraging both innovation education and transdisciplinary learning. STEAM (Science, technology, engineering, art, mathematics) pedagogy provides such a pathway.

STEAM education has been building momentum since 2007 as a promising pedagogy to support creativity, problem solving, collaboration and enhance interest in STEM fields (Allina, 2017). K12 schools, higher education programming, researchers, and informal learning environments have all been promoting STEAM education. However, barriers remain including a lack of understanding of STEAM by teachers, lack of teacher planning time across disciplines, and the constrained school organizational structures where disciplines are siloed (Caton, 2021).

Additionally, complications in moving this pedagogy to the forefront can be partially attributed by the muddy definitions and various representations of STEAM education across both formal and informal learning environments. In 2019, Perignat and Katz-Buonicontro found in their comprehensive literature review of STEAM publications from 2007-2018 that:
1) there existed a lack of deep understanding as to the diversity of the arts;
2) the arts were most often utilized as the “end product” rather than serving as a transdisciplinary vehicle in the learning and
3) a dearth of measured learning outcomes existed.

One reason that may help to explain these findings is the lack of concrete examples in ways to situate STEAM practices within a learning environment. It can be argued that the more curricular exemplars provided to educators could result in both deepening the research base and increase opportunities for STEAM education.

Thus, this presentation is to offer one such example of STEAM curricula that holds promise for both scaling up and sustaining across a K16 scope and sequence. The curricula couples culturally responsive teaching within a STEAM learning environment whereby students are at the forefront of exploration and decision making. We find that utilizing this curriculum framework provides a necessary shift from many “traditional” STEAM curricula. This shift moves from prototyping, robotics, app development, and/or the general product making opportunity that Blikstein (2013) coins “the keychain syndrome” to offering students meaningful opportunities to probe issues relevant to their own lives and communities allowing for robust entry points in learning.

A concrete exemplar of this type of curriculum piloted with graduate students during Fall 2020 offering insights into:
1) STEAM curriculum development aligned to this framework,
2) artifacts of learning by students
3) utilizing online learning platforms to effectively teach through a STEAM approach will be shared and discussed.

Keywords:

STEAM education, Creativity, Curricula.