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Full-Text Articles in Education
Chapter 21- Mentoring Graduate Underrepresented Minorities In Stem, Benjamin C. Flores, Jessica Shenberger-Trujillo, Milka Montes
Chapter 21- Mentoring Graduate Underrepresented Minorities In Stem, Benjamin C. Flores, Jessica Shenberger-Trujillo, Milka Montes
Making Connections
In this chapter, we discuss high-impact mentoring practices for graduate students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). We make a case for inclusive and assets/strengths-based mentoring approaches as a strategy for increasing the number of doctoral degrees awarded to historically underrepresented minorities (i.e., Hispanics, African Americans, Native Americans, Alaska Natives, and Pacific Islanders); improving their levels of satisfaction with doctoral programs and reducing the notoriously extended time to the PhD that they endure. We offer two examples of national programs committed to promoting graduate student success through professional development and mentoring strategies in which instrumental support, sponsorship, psychological support, …
Chapter 16- Becoming Awares: Mentoring Undergraduate Women In Engineering And Sciences, Shirley L. Yu, Arianna Black, Gönül Kaletunç
Chapter 16- Becoming Awares: Mentoring Undergraduate Women In Engineering And Sciences, Shirley L. Yu, Arianna Black, Gönül Kaletunç
Making Connections
The Aspiration for Women’s Advancement and Retention in Engineering and Sciences (AWARES) mentorship program was designed to support women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) majors as they transition from their undergraduate degree programs to the workforce. The AWARES program was structured around topics relevant to women in STEM careers, including but not limited to interviewing and job offer negotiation, career development, navigating social dynamics in the workplace, and establishing and growing a professional network. Based in tenets of social cognitive theory, AWARES aims to use expert and group mentorship to increase young women’s self-efficacy for career-related soft skills …
Examining Spaces For Integrating Physics And Computing Through Classroom Inquiry, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Kristin Searle, Douglas Ball, Soojeong Jeong
Examining Spaces For Integrating Physics And Computing Through Classroom Inquiry, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Kristin Searle, Douglas Ball, Soojeong Jeong
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
As computing becomes an essential component of professional practice across science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields, integration of computing across content areas in K-12 classrooms is also becoming important. Particularly within science classrooms, computer science and computational thinking (CS/CT) are novel and necessary skills for modeling, working with data, and other foundational science skills. Finding ways to engage students in practicing and learning CT within authentic science learning is challenging for most teachers. In this article, the authors report on one teacher’s efforts to engage high school students in maker-based physics education, integrating computational thinking by designing and building …
Rural Teacher Attitudes And Engagement With Computing And Technology, Melissa P. Mendenhall, Colby Tofel-Grehl, David Feldon
Rural Teacher Attitudes And Engagement With Computing And Technology, Melissa P. Mendenhall, Colby Tofel-Grehl, David Feldon
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
The purpose of this sequential Case Study-Mixed Methods research is to explore rural teacher attitudes toward, approaches to, and engagement with making and computational thinking during STEM professional development and co-teaching learning experiences. Specifically, we examine the professional learning needs of two rural, middle school teachers as they engage technology. Using the lens of cultural historical activity theory, this paper examines the ways in which teacher attitude about computing shifted throughout professional learning and instructional practice. Findings show three broad themes that emerge surrounding teacher attitudes, approaches, and engagement with technology: Anxiety, Independent Learner, and Integration. Additionally, findings suggest that …
Cookie-Jar Alarms: An Analysis Of First-Grade Students’ Gendered Conceptions Of Engineers Following A Programming Design Task, April Mitchell, Kimberly H. Lott, Colby Tofel-Grehl
Cookie-Jar Alarms: An Analysis Of First-Grade Students’ Gendered Conceptions Of Engineers Following A Programming Design Task, April Mitchell, Kimberly H. Lott, Colby Tofel-Grehl
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
Women remain underrepresented in engineering and broadening participation has recently become the focus of education reform efforts. Increased emphasis on K-12 engineering education calls for the design of learning environments and curricula that increase interest and conceptual understanding of engineering work, beginning in the early years of childhood. We seek to understand what works, for whom, in what contexts, how it works, and how engineering curricula can be improved to promote social justice. Here, we evaluate the impact of a curricular intervention designed to promote equity in elementary engineering education. The integrated STEM curriculum unit engages first-grade students in programming …
Rural Teachers' Cultural And Epistemic Shifts In Stem Teaching And Learning, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Kristin A. Searle, Andrea Hawkman, Beth L. Macdonald, Mario I. Suárez
Rural Teachers' Cultural And Epistemic Shifts In Stem Teaching And Learning, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Kristin A. Searle, Andrea Hawkman, Beth L. Macdonald, Mario I. Suárez
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
This article focuses on the ways in which integrated curriculum can improve STEM teaching and learning within rural spaces. Using a design-based research approach, this study focuses on rural teachers' experiences of professional learning and development training as they learn to engage computing and maker technologies in their elementary classrooms as tools for teaching students about difficult histories of immigration, migration, and forced relocation across the United States.
Electrifying: One Teacher’S Discursive And Instructional Changes Through Engagement In E-Textiles To Teach Science Content, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Eliza Jex, Kristin Searle, Douglas Ball, Xin Zhao, Georgia Burnell
Electrifying: One Teacher’S Discursive And Instructional Changes Through Engagement In E-Textiles To Teach Science Content, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Eliza Jex, Kristin Searle, Douglas Ball, Xin Zhao, Georgia Burnell
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
This paper shares findings from the first of its kind quasi-experimental mixed methods study exploring the potential impacts on teacher instruction through engagement with making and e-textiles. Because engagement in hands-on inquiry has demonstrated strong promise for increasing student interest and engagement in STEM careers, finding curricular approaches that engage students in project-based learning remains important. As such, the Maker Movement and making has gained traction as a possible effort to improve such outcomes. This study shares outcomes from analyses of one teacher’s first engagement with teaching eighth-grade science through e-textiles. Four of his classes were taught using his traditional …
An Examination Of The Role Of First-Year College-Level Mathematics In Stem Field Major Persistence At A Hispanic-Serving Institution, Jaimi Paschal, Amanda Taggart
An Examination Of The Role Of First-Year College-Level Mathematics In Stem Field Major Persistence At A Hispanic-Serving Institution, Jaimi Paschal, Amanda Taggart
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
This study examined the influence of mathematics course-taking on Latina/o science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) major persistence utilizing data from first-year STEM majors at a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI). Findings indicated that students who passed a first-term college-level mathematics course had significantly greater odds of persisting in STEM majors than those who did not, demonstrating the importance of early mathematics support to increased STEM major persistence.
Equitable Engagement In Stem: Using E-Textiles To Challenge The Positioning Of Non-Dominant Girls In School Science, Kristin A. Searle, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Janet Breitenstein
Equitable Engagement In Stem: Using E-Textiles To Challenge The Positioning Of Non-Dominant Girls In School Science, Kristin A. Searle, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Janet Breitenstein
Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications
This paper examines how working with sewable, programmable electronics embedded in textiles (e-textiles) impacted the self-perceptions and actions of two middle school girls from non-dominant communities as they navigated their place within science class. Using analytic induction (Erickson, 1986), we explore the phenomena around their experiences and the influence of their teachers’ perceptions. Findings indicate that the personalizable nature of e-textiles created a meaningful opportunity for students to engage in science class in a new way.
A Bayesian Network Meta-Analysis To Synthesize The Influence Of Contexts Of Scaffolding Use On Cognitive Outcomes In Stem Education, Brian Robert Belland, Andrew Walker, Nam Ju Kim
A Bayesian Network Meta-Analysis To Synthesize The Influence Of Contexts Of Scaffolding Use On Cognitive Outcomes In Stem Education, Brian Robert Belland, Andrew Walker, Nam Ju Kim
Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications
Computer-based scaffolding provides temporary support that enables students to participate in and become more proficient at complex skills like problem solving, argumentation, and evaluation. While meta-analyses have addressed between-subject differences on cognitive outcomes resulting from scaffolding, none has addressed within-subject gains. This leaves much quantitative scaffolding literature not covered by existing meta-analyses. To address this gap, this study used Bayesian network meta-analysis to synthesize within-subjects (pre–post) differences resulting from scaffolding in 56 studies. We generated the posterior distribution using 20,000 Markov Chain Monte Carlo samples. Scaffolding has a consistently strong effect across student populations, STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) …
Stitching Codeable Circuits: High School Students' Learning About Circuitry And Coding With Electronic Textiles, Breanne Krystine Litts, Yasmin B. Kafai, Debora A. Lui, Justice T. Walker, Sari A. Widman
Stitching Codeable Circuits: High School Students' Learning About Circuitry And Coding With Electronic Textiles, Breanne Krystine Litts, Yasmin B. Kafai, Debora A. Lui, Justice T. Walker, Sari A. Widman
Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications
Learning about circuitry by connecting a battery, light bulb, and wires is a common activity in many science classrooms. In this paper, we expand students’ learning about circuitry with electronic textiles, which use conductive thread instead of wires and sewable LEDs instead of lightbulbs, by integrating programming sensor inputs and light outputs and examining how the two domains interact.We implemented an electronic textiles unit with 23 high school students ages 16–17 years who learned how to craft and code circuits with the LilyPad Arduino, an electronic textile construction kit. Our analyses not only confirm significant increases in students’ understanding of …
Critical Reflections On Teacher Conceptions Of Race As Related To The Effectiveness Of Science Learning, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Kristin Searle
Critical Reflections On Teacher Conceptions Of Race As Related To The Effectiveness Of Science Learning, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Kristin Searle
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
The Maker Movement’s current traction in education revolves around the notion that constructing artifacts improves student interest and engagement. Often touted as a new and important way for students to access STEM content, “making” activities offer a unique opportunity to disrupt the traditional perceptions of who can successfully “do” STEM. Blending familiar materials and practices (e.g. sewing with a needle and thread) with atypical materials (e.g., conductive thread and sewable LED bulbs), electronic textiles, or e-textiles, allow makers to create working circuits in ways that connect with their out-of-school lives, including heritage and vernacular cultural practices. This article describes the …
The Best Laid Plans: Educational Innovation In Elementary Teacher Generated Integrated Stem Lesson Plans, Christina M. Sias, Louis S. Nadelson, Stephanie M. Juth, Anne L. Seifert
The Best Laid Plans: Educational Innovation In Elementary Teacher Generated Integrated Stem Lesson Plans, Christina M. Sias, Louis S. Nadelson, Stephanie M. Juth, Anne L. Seifert
Teacher Education and Leadership Student Research
Students need to be prepared for the 21st century by developing the literacy skills necessary for participating in the age of synthesis—an age that requires a progressive set of skills and knowledge. The authors identified nine educational innovations that are perceived to be effective for preparing students for the 21st century age of synthesis society. They coded a collection of 39 teacher-generated Grade 3–5 science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) lesson plans to document the extent to which the teachers included these nine educational innovations their STEM lesson planning. The authors found practices such as project-based and student-centered learning (which …
Stem School Discourse Patterns, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Carolyn M. Callahan
Stem School Discourse Patterns, Colby Tofel-Grehl, Carolyn M. Callahan
Teacher Education and Leadership Faculty Publications
In a cross case analysis of six specialized STEM schools across the United States selected on the basis of varied geographic location and school model type, the authors explore the ways in which classroom discursvive strutures established by teachers impact students' perceptions of their own agency and authority as relates to their science learning within specialized STEM schools. As national interest in specialized STEM schools grows, a deep need to understand the instructional practices that impact students motivation and interest has arisen. By better understanding how teachers drive classroom discourse through questioning techniques, student responses and reflections can be understood …
Graduate Students’ Teaching Experiences Improve Their Methodological Research Skills, David F. Feldon, James Peugh, Briana E. Timmerman, Michelle A. Maher, Melissa Hurst, Denise Strickland, Joanna A. Gilmore, Cindy Stiegelmeyer
Graduate Students’ Teaching Experiences Improve Their Methodological Research Skills, David F. Feldon, James Peugh, Briana E. Timmerman, Michelle A. Maher, Melissa Hurst, Denise Strickland, Joanna A. Gilmore, Cindy Stiegelmeyer
Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications
Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) graduate students are often encouraged to maximize their engagement with supervised research and minimize teaching obligations. However, the process of teaching students engaged in inquiry provides practice in the application of important research skills. Using a performance rubric, we compared the quality of methodological skills demonstrated in written research proposals for two groups of early career graduate students (those with both teaching and research responsibilities and those with only research responsibilities) at the beginning and end of an academic year. After statistically controlling for preexisting differences between groups, students who both taught and conducted …
A Call For Performance-Based Data In The Study Of Stem Ph.D. Education, David F. Feldon, Michelle A. Maher, Briana E. Timmerman
A Call For Performance-Based Data In The Study Of Stem Ph.D. Education, David F. Feldon, Michelle A. Maher, Briana E. Timmerman
Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications
Understanding the scholarly development of Ph.D. students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) is vital to the preparation of the scientific workforce. During doctoral study, students learn to be professional scientists and acquire the competencies to succeed in those roles. However, this complex process is not well studied. Research to date suffers from overreliance on a narrow range of methods that cannot provide data appropriate for addressing questions of causality or effectiveness of specific practices in doctoral education. We advocate a shift in focus from student and instructor self-report toward the use of actual performance data as a remedy …