Pathways to Teaching: The Cluttered Online Infrastructure for Potential Teacher Candidates

ABSTRACTThe national interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) has called attention to P-12 education, the STEM pipeline. Education of teachers is a primary influence on the education of children in the classroom. While high school (and often middle school) teachers are versed in the content of a particular aspect of STEM (e.g. Mathematics or Chemistry), elementary teachers, on the other end of the pipeline, are educated as generalists, with a primary goal of setting the foundations for future learning.In 2004, a team of STEM and education faculty at St. Catherine University (SCU) was called together, united by their interest in improving STEM education for all students at SCU, particularly women. Combining the content expertise of the biology, chemistry, physics/engineering, and mathematics departments with the methods expertise of the education department, the team designed courses that made STEM concepts more engaging and relevant to students. In 2010, the STEM Certificate was solidified and required of all elementary education students. It is comprised of three interdisciplinary, team-taught, lab based courses that are open to all undergraduate majors at the institution. Each course is centered on one discipline (i.e. biology, chemistry, or engineering/physics). Chemistry of Life is the chemistry-focused course. The course was designed to include a capstone project. As an introduction to materials science, nanoscience was selected as the theme for the projects. The topic allowed for socially relevant and also highly interdisciplinary projects. Students working in teams of three or four, designed projects, determined how to measure and obtain data, and analyzed and interpreted results. A content and confidence assessment given to students before and after the projects showed an increase in both their understanding of nanomaterials and their confidence in conducting a nanoscience project.

This study has been conducted to investigate the opinions of mathematics teacher candidates on science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) training and the activities designed by them. It has been carried out using the case study method, which is one of the qualitative research patterns. In this study, semi-structured interview forms and activity cards have been used to gather data. While semi-structured interview forms served to elicit teacher candidates’ opinions on STEM, activity cards were employed to ask them to design an activity in which they could put their training on STEM into practice. The study has been conducted with 34 senior mathematics education students and the data obtained have been analyzed using the content analysis method. It has been concluded that mathematics teacher candidates have positive views on STEM training. The activities designed by the candidate teachers can be categorized under four categories, which are interdisciplinary, the engineering field it is related to, the preferred method and the activities that are not suitable for STEM. Teacher candidates should be trained on how to integrate STEM education into their lessons. Stem activity examples should be presented to teacher candidates for applicability. Keywords: Mathematics teacher candidate, stem, activity, training, opinion

STEM (Scienc e, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education has gained global recognition for its role in nurturing 21st-century skills such as critical thinking, creativity, problem-solving, collaboration, and innovation. The effective integration of STEM education in school classrooms largely depends on teachers’ awareness and understanding of its interdisciplinary nature, pedagogical approaches, and curricular relevance. Teacher education institutions therefore play a crucial role in developing adequate awareness of STEM education among pre-service teachers. The present study aims to examine STEM education awareness among pre-service teachers enrolled in teacher education programmes. A quantitative descriptive survey method was adopted, and data were collected from 120 pre-service teachers using a self-developed STEM Education Awareness Scale. The findings indicate that pre-service teachers demonstrate moderate awareness of STEM education, with noticeable gaps in interdisciplinary integration and application-oriented understanding. The study emphasizes the need for systematic orientation, curricular integration, and professional support within teacher education programmes to strengthen STEM education awareness among future teachers.

Background Holistic STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education is essential to harness the potential of young learners as they are the future leaders and workforce in the Industrial Revolution (IR) 4.0 and Society 5.0 era. Unfortunately, the teaching of STEM subjects that are rich in content does not necessarily encourage the development of talents for critical thinking, creativity, and complex problem solving. This study investigates the effectiveness of an immersive learning approach in STEM science classes in Senior High Schools in Indonesia and explains the extent to which this approach is supported by applicable principles on how this approach can be used to enhance student learning. Referring to a case study conducted in a senior high school in Bengkulu, this study discusses the strategies implemented, the challenges faced, and their impact on student engagement and understanding of content and learning 21st century skills. The findings indicate that the integrated immersive learning STEM curriculum in schools has resulted in an 82.5% increase in student learning motivation, a 20% ~ 35% increase in programming skills, and a 27.5% increase in collaboration skills. However, obstacles such as teacher education and technological facility constraints still exist. Based on various perspectives and real-world experiences, this note recommends a critical approach to promote the embedding of deep learning in STEM education through targeted policies and systemic support. Hopefully, these suggestions can build educational innovations that are sustainable enough to be disseminated to other regions in Indonesia.

Community Learning Centre (CLC) is an non-formal learning institution working at grassroots level of the society. It derives from the initiative of UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) launched in 1988, as part of the Education for All Target Program in the Asia-Pacific region. The idea of building a lifelong learning society to promote the economy and appeal to participation of all social groups through education and the role of the CLC as a special autonomous community is the spirit and reason of CLCs’ existence [7]. In Vietnam, As of 2015 there have been more than 11,900 CLCs established in 10,600 communes and wards nationwide [4], working as informal and non-formal educational institutions in the commune level. STEM education has been a new trending method of teaching and learning in the last decades originated from US under the demands of educating and training new labour generations with expertise in practical knowledge and skills. STEM education can be in forms of formal and informal learning, in schools and in lifelong learning institutions. STEM education has been imported to Southeast Asian countries including Vietnam in the last recent years and become a trending word in educational discourse. In Vietnam, STEM education has been piloted in a few public schools of big cities of designed in international schools and private institutions of the nation. Yet it is a luxury educational product and strange in remote areas of Vietnam where most people are poor and live under disadvantaged conditions. While, CLCs as part of continuing educational institutions of the country have exited in all provinces, but struggling with the crisis of operation. In this context, there has been a model of CLC choosing STEM education as its main operating component and working with mostly children in informal ways such as supporting STEM clubs in local schools, running mobile STEM in villages and connecting STEM experts with local teachers. This is a groundbreaking pilot model in the ethnic and mountainous context, with close link between science - education - research and private sector participation with local government budget and government-led activities: Ha Giang City’s Community Learning Centre (HCLC) in Vietnam. It can probably be considered as a good example for other places to learn. The STEM education program of the HCLC is designed with the purpose of promoting formal and informal STEM education for ethnic minority students within the city. The three main aspects for changes after operating this STEM element are (1) improvement of learning environments and accessing to hands-on learning materials for children through a formal and informal science-integrated education system; (2) teachers’ and education managers’ professional development, and the enhancement of their provision of teaching learning material and through capacity building programs; And (3) opportunity of accessing better quality education for community, especially poor and ethnic minority children within remote suburbs of the city through free of charge enrollment for the community STEM program. In line with the content of the workshop, the following analysis focuses on the third aspec the STEM program that has been contributing to the improvement of better quality education for poor ethnic minority children in the 3 rural communes of Ha Giang city. This presentation will also provide some suggestions to the operation of STEM integrated education in CLCs or other community-based learning institutions in ethnic minority areas.

As nationwide teacher shortages continue to grow (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2018; Garcia & Weiss, 2019; Sutcher et al., 2016), the standards for which a teaching candidate is admitted into teacher education programs have continued to remain steadfast in rigid assessment scores and vast amounts of “hoop-jumping” for potential teacher education candidates who otherwise meet all of the academic and nonacademic requirements, with the exception of standardized assessments, such as the SAT or ACT (Ingersoll, et al., 2014; Lankford et al., 2014). After potential candidates with high GPAs, satisfied criteria, and dreams of becoming a teacher were being rejected, in the same week they received a Dean’s Honor Roll letter, faculty began to question key assessments used to admit students. In addition, key accreditation bodies (i.e., CAEP) loosened their qualifications regarding candidate selection and admission.

Our current society faces enormous environmental challenges. Now is the time to stand up for a sustainable future. This request for action also concerns our STEM education community to take the transformational potential of teaching and learning. Teachers are decisive factors in ensuring the achievement of creative and sustainable learning outcomes in mathematics and science education, in fostering young peoples’ competences and empowering them to become responsible and active citizens. We need to share good practices, research results and innovative classroom materials that allow for implementing approaches that support the implementation and scaling up of education for sustainability. Educating the Educators (ETE) is an international conference series on professional development in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education that brings together teacher educators, policy makers, teachers and various other stakeholders related to STEM education. The fourth edition of the ETE conference series was hosted by Utrecht University, ICSE and the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, in collaboration with the MOST project. ETE IV focused on implementing and scaling up innovative teaching approaches in STEM education with an emphasis on open schooling for sustainability education. The aim was to discuss different ways of working, the roles of teaching materials, and structures needed for innovations in STEM education. ETE IV featured both traditional and innovative formats to benefit of a diverse circle of participants from research, practice and policy. Vivid exchange and collaborative work were ensured through spaces for co-creation. This volume reflects the main topics of discussion and the participants’ conference experiences.

Key Practices in P‑6 Integrated STEM Education: Delphi Panel Insights Over the past two decades, educators and policymakers have worked to improve STEM education for P‑12 students, yet patterns of engagement remain persistently unchanged, potentially hindering interest in STEM careers. This paper focuses on findings from a modified Delphi panel study involving expert teacher educators across the US. We identify crucial practices teacher educators use to prepare candidates for integrated STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) teaching in P‑6 classrooms. Additionally, the research highlights key attributes of integrated P‑6 STEM education compared to single‑discipline curricula. The study reveals 16 interconnected essential practices and nine differentiating attributes that define integrated P‑6 STEM education, offering insights for researchers, teacher practitioners, and policymakers.

Students must be inspired, engaged, and have deep understanding of STEM content and their applications if they are to consider future studies and/or jobs in STEM fields. One avenue for enhancing STEM literacy, STEM concepts, skills and applications – while at the same time supporting the development of twenty-first century skills – is through the implementation of digital video games (DVGs) in STEM education. The authors report on the process of researching and creating DVGs in a STEM-focused methods course in teacher education, and systematically demonstrate the potential of DVGs to address each of the STEM disciplines in a cohesive and comprehensive manner. Three main themes emerged from the creation of DVGs, namely i) STEM pedagogy, ii) technology, and iii) change. Teacher education, professional development, and curriculum are implicated for improving teacher self-efficacy and beliefs in the goals of technology, and for targeting technological innovation and implementation in STEM education.

BotSTEM is an ERASMUS+ project. Its outputs are aimed to provide in- and pre-service teachers in Childhood and Primary Education with a didactical framework, research-based materials and best practices using integrated Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics (STEM) and robot-based approaches for enhancing scientific literacy in young children. Initial results from the implementation of activities following the proposed model in preschools in Spain are presented here. Despite the possible obstacles that preschool teachers initially expressed, the preliminary analysis indicates that the proposed STEM integrated framework, including inquiry teaching and engineering design methodologies, can be used with children as young as 4 y.o. In the case of a project about magnets, the children seem to have learnt some scientific ideas, applied these ideas to design a magnetic toy and learnt about spatial orientation using robots.

BackgroundTeacher emotions are sometimes underplayed in the research field of teaching and teacher education. Also, teachers often undergo transformations in their professional identities during education reforms. However, very few studies explore the connections between teacher emotions and their professional identities against the background of education reforms, especially in Asian contexts. There is an increasing emphasis on STEM as an education reform in China and the world, and a deep understanding of STEM teacher emotions and professional identities is necessary in the fast development of STEM education. This study examined how a STEM teacher emotionally constructed her professional identities under the STEM education reform.MethodsThis is a 3-year longitudinal case study employing a narrative inquiry approach with one STEM teacher in China. Data collection included one in-depth, semi-structured interview, three conversations, personal emotional diaries, and correspondence records. A four-step data analysis was conducted.ResultsThree major themes reflecting the participant’s emotional professional identities emerged, including “an interested but confused learner”, “an enthusiastic but nervous explorer”, and “an excited but unsatisfied mentor”. In the participant’s experiences as a learner, explorer, and mentor, positive and negative emotions were always intertwined. These helped construct and shape her professional identities and encouraged her to be the best STEM teacher that she could be.ConclusionThis study provides a series of vivid and dynamic pictures of a STEM teacher’s emotions and professional identities against the background of STEM education reform in China from a 3-year longitudinal perspective. It also indicates the personal, social, cultural, and contextual factors that could have strong effects on teachers’ emotional experiences and the construction of professional identities. Furthermore, this study reveals that three processes (i.e., the process of education changes, the process of creating new or multiple professional identities, and the generation process of teacher emotions) could be intertwined and developed together.

Researching the current context of STEM education for preservice teachers in developing country is a practical issue that helped us have a more realistic perspective on this problem. This study was conducted a cross-sectional study through questionnaire and interviews with 1,000 preservice teachers from universities and colleges in a Southeastern regional country with high investment in STEM education and STEM-based preparation for teachers: Vietnam. The results showed that preservice teachers self-assessed their competencies in implementing STEM educational activities at good level. However, there still existed some limitations such as difficulties in linking knowledge with practice and handling situations that arise during the STEM teaching process. The study suggested that it was necessary to increase skills training and gain experience for preservice teachers to improve the quality of STEM education. In addition, our study also confirmed the context of STEM education in a developing country in Southeast Asia in terms of gaps in quantitative research and the potential for further in-depth research on STEM education, especially in the group of teachers and preservice teachers.

Background The growing interest in educational robotics has led to increased research. Understanding the effects of robotic applications can improve teacher education. This study investigates the impact of robotic STEM applications on pre-service science teachers’ achievement, interest, performance, and views on STEM teacher identity using a mixed-methods approach. Result The research found significant differences in achievement between pre-service teachers in robotic and non-robotic groups. The robotic group showed significant improvement in electrical circuit application performance, while the non-robotic group did not. Interest scores also favored the robotics group. Notably, pre-service teachers in the robotic group perceived STEM and science teachers as distinct, while those in the non-robotic group saw some differences. Additionally, the robotic group preferred to identify as STEM teachers, whereas the non-robotic group preferred science teachers. Conclusions This study’s findings suggest that robotic STEM applications have positive effects on teacher candidates’ success, performance, and interest. It also provides a perspective on the role of robotic applications in the development of STEM teacher identity.

Reforming the teacher education system has been a key government policy towards improving school education in India. While recent curriculum and governance reforms articulate a new vision of teacher education that underscores a symbiotic relationship between teacher education and school education, it fails to engage enough with the most important participant of the teacher education system—the teacher educator. Changes to curriculum and governance process in the absence of a pro-active engagement of teacher educators with the reforms can do little to influence the teacher education processes and outcomes. The work of pre-service teacher educators is complex because their responsibilities relate to both school and higher education. The distinctiveness of their work, identity and professional development has always been marginalized in educational discourse. This article analyses select educational documents to examine the construction of work and identity of higher education-based teacher educators. It proposes the development of a professional framework of practice through a collective process, which would help understand the work of teacher educators and offer various possibilities for their professional development.

Generally, social media platforms have been utilised to convey personal and non-academic information. Lecturers at higher education institutions have treated social media as a non-formal means of communication. However, with the advent of COVID-19-induced lockdowns, social media platforms gained importance in conveying both formal and non-formal information. This study thus analysed the effects of utilising the whatsapp platform for teaching and learning at one Midlands Teacher Education institution. Through the connectivism lens, the study adopted a qualitative case study generating data through interviews, observations and focus group discussions. Findings pointed to the fact that though sceptical about social media platforms in general, lecturers and students utilise whatsapp to a greater extent for online teaching and learning and for conveying important information. Most students own smartphones and Whatsapp, and though prone to cyberbullying and circulation of falsehoods, the platform was preferred to other platforms as it was categorised under cheaper modes of conveying information to many people at once. The study recommends that while integrating social media applications in teaching and learning, lecturers and students should verify the authenticity of social media information. This study contributes to the ongoing discourse on the use of blended learning and the possibility of utilising social media in educational contexts. Keywords: Social Media, Teacher Education, Whatsapp, Cyberbullying.