The effectiveness of an integratedSTEMcurriculum unit on middle school students' life science learning

Abstract

Recent calls for reform in K-12 science education and the National Academy of Engineering's Grand Challenges for Engineering in the 21st Century emphasize improving science teaching, students' engagement, and learning. In this study, we designed and implemented a curriculum unit for sixth-grade students (i = 1305). The curriculum unit integrated science and engineering content and practices to teach ecology, water pollution, and engineering design. We investigated the designed integrated STEM unit's effectiveness in students' science learning outcomes on pre-, post-, and delayed post-assessments. We collected pre-and postassessment data of students' science learning outcomes for both the baseline group (taught via existing districtadopted curriculum) and an intervention group (taught with integrated life science and engineering curriculum). We used a quasi-experimental research design and examined differences between baseline and intervention groups. We used ANCOVA to explore differences in students' learning in baseline and intervention groups. Furthermore, for students in the intervention group, we conducted repeated-measures ANOVA to investigate knowledge retention. Our analyses also accounted for students' gender and People of Color

The effects of a STEM-based intervention on middle school students science achievement and learning motivation

“…Accordingly, these results indicated that the STEM-based learning environment is more effective than the curriculum-based learning environment in improving student achievement. This result is compatible with literature showing that STEM learning environments positively effect academic achievement and science learning (Akkaya, 2019;Angwal et al, 2019;Anwar et al, 2022;Büyükbastırmacı, 2019;Cotabish et al, 2013;Çalışıcı, 2018;Çetin, 2019;Dedetürk et al, 2020;Doğan, 2019;Fan & Yu, 2017;Gazibeyoğlu, 2018;Green, 2012;Gülen, 2016;Kapan, 2019;Koca, 2018;Yıldırım, 2016). Angwal et al (2019) reported that the STEM learning environment, which includes the engineering design process, is more effective than the traditional learning environment in improving students' science achievement.…”

“…Therefore, researchers worldwide are conducting various research on STEM education. For example, studies have investigated the effects of STEM education on variables such as achievement, science content knowledge, motivation, attitude, problem-solving, higher-order thinking skills, and career interest (e.g., Angwal et al, 2019;Anwar et al, 2022;Cotabish et al, 2013;Fan & Yu, 2017;John et al, 2016;Kopcha et al, 2017;Lam et al, 2008;Lin et al, 2019;Ngo, 2021;Nugent et al, 2015). As stated earlier, STEM has become a focus area for education in Türkiye in recent years.…”

“…De Loof et al (2022) proposed that researchers investigate the impact of integrated STEM education on cognitive and affective outcomes. Likewise, Anwar et al (2022) indicated that more studies are needed to compare the effectiveness of integrated STEM and traditional teaching approaches on student achievement. The authors also suggested that future research also consider the motivation variable.…”

Cultivating culturally sustaining integrated science, technology, engineering, and mathematics classrooms: A narrative inquiry case study of a science teacher

“…Johnson and the researchers have a long‐established partnership as teacher‐researchers. In the past, Mrs. Johnson had previously worked with Guzey in a professional development program on developing life science and engineering design curricula (Anwar et al, 2022). For two consecutive summers, Mrs. Johnson and two other participating teachers and research personnel spent three weeks developing an integrated science and engineering curriculum that explicitly integrated engineering design into a life science curriculum.…”