Guest editorial and introduction: STEM and STEM education
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POINT AND COUNTERPOINT
Guest editorial and introduction: STEM and STEM education Judy Anderson 1 Published online: 18 September 2020 # Australian Curriculum Studies Association 2020
Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) have featured in the media over recent years as politicians have called for increased investments in business and industry to ensure Australia’s competitiveness in global markets. Such interest is almost invariably followed by calls for improvements in students’ results on international tests in mathematics and science, improvements in the teaching of the STEM subjects with more qualified teachers, and increased enrolments in STEM degrees to fill shortages of qualified mathematicians and scientists. Stakeholders tend to seize such opportunities requesting education systems to improve teaching and learning and ‘return to the basics’ as if the curriculum has somehow been changed so that students do not need to learn fundamental concepts. The focus of the STEM curriculum subjects has always required the learning of important content and processes. What appears to be different in recent times is a call for greater focus on connecting knowledge across the STEM subjects, on using STEM knowledge flexibly to solve more authentic problems, on developing essential skills for more technologically advanced work environments, and on understanding the STEM career possibilities available in changing workplaces. Such calls for change in STEM education have led to innovations in teaching and learning by teachers of the STEM subjects. Since the increased focus on STEM education in Australia, many STEM teachers have been investigating ways to adapt their programs and practices to improve student motivation and engagement in STEM and to increase opportunities for students to experience the practices of STEM professionals through real-world problems. The collection of papers in this issue of Point and Counterpoint present some of these innovations but also raise important questions still to be addressed. Determining what STEM curriculum might look like in
* Judy Anderson [email protected] 1
The University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
schools is a key issue if teachers are to design learning experiences which meet stakeholder expectations. While the mandated curriculum designed as separate STEM subjects must still be addressed, teachers do have flexibility to design tasks, lessons and units of work which connect and integrate aspects of each of the STEM subjects. Designing and implementing integrated STEM curriculum is considered in Anderson’s paper in this collection while Lyons presents a range of different approaches to designing integrated STEM curriculum. His Russian Doll analogy raises many questions about the roles of each of the STEM subjects when solving real-world problems. Cameron’s paper focusinges more on the role of technology curriculum in preparing the workers of the future. She also provides useful background information on the Australian curriculum and how
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