LRHE Publications and Resources

• Usable STEM: Student Outcomes in Science and Engineering Associated with the Iterative Science and Engineering Instructional Model 
  by Nancy Butler Songer, Julia E. Calabrese, Holly Cordner, and Daniel Aina
  • Abstract: While our world consistently presents complicated, interdisciplinary problems with STEM foundations, most pre-university curricula do not encourage drawing on multidisciplinary knowledge in the sciences and engineering to create solutions. We developed an instructional approach, Iterative Science and Engineering (ISE), that cycles through scientific investigation and engineering design and culminates in constructing a solution to a local environmental challenge. Next, we created, revised, and evaluated a six-week ISE curricular program, Invasive Insects, culminating in 6th–9th-grade students building traps to mitigate local invasive insect populations. Over three Design-Based Research (DBR) cycles, we gathered and analyzed identical pre and post-test data from 554 adolescents to address the research question: what three-dimensional (3D) science and engineering knowledge do adolescents demonstrate over three DBR cycles associated with a curricular program following the Iterative Science and Engineering instructional approach? Results document students’ significant statistical improvements, with differential outcomes in different cycles. For example, most students demonstrated significant learning of 3D science and engineering argument construction in all cycles—still, students only significantly improved engineering design when they performed guided reflection on their designs and physically built a second trap. Our results suggest that the development, refinement, and empirical evaluation of an ISE curricular program led to students’ design, building, evaluation, and sharing of their learning of mitigating local invasive insect populations. To address complex, interdisciplinary challenges, we must provide opportunities for fluid and iterative STEM learning through scientific investigation and engineering design cycles.
• How do we design curricula to foster innovation, motivation and interest in STEM learning?
  by Julia E. Calabrese, Nancy Butler Songer, Holly Cordner, and Daniel Aina
  • Abstract: The authors designed a science and engineering curricular program that includes design features that promote student interest and motivation and examined teachers' and students' views on meaningfulness, motivation and interest. The research approach consisted of mixed methods, including content analyses and descriptive statistics. The curricular program successfully included all four of the US National Academies of Sciences' design features for promoting interest and motivation through scientific investigation and engineering design. During interviews, teachers and students expressed evidence of design features associated with interest and motivation. After experiencing the program, more than 60% of all students scored high on all four science and engineering meaningfulness and interest survey items. A curricular program that extends science learning through the engineered design of solutions is an innovative approach to foster both conceptual knowledge development and interest and motivation in science and engineering.
• Science Education and the Learning Sciences: A coevolutionary connection
  by Nancy Butler Songer and Yael Kali
  • A chapter included in the Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences.
• Eco-Solutioning: The Design and Evaluation of a Curricular Unit to Foster Students’ Creation of Solutions to Address Local Socio-Scientific Issues
  by Nancy Butler Songer and Guillermo D. Ibarrola Recalde.
  • Abstract: The global pandemic and climate change have led to unprecedented environmental, social, and economic challenges with interdisciplinary STEM foundations. Even as STEM learning has never been more important, very few pre-college programs prepare students to address these challenges by emphasizing socio-scientific issue (SSI) problem solving and the engineering design of solutions to address local phenomena. The paper discusses the design and evaluation of a pre-college, SSI curricular unit where students expand their learning by creating solutions to increase biodiversity within local urban neighborhoods. The learning approach, which we call eco-solutioning, builds from current vision and policy documents in STEM education emphasizing phenomenon-centric instructional materials, science investigations, and engineering design. The paper outlines design principles for creating an eco-solutioning instructional unit that guides young students to: collect and analyze data on local organisms, use an engineering design approach to craft solutions to increase local biodiversity, and present their solutions to local city planners and community members. Two cycles of research studies evaluated student learning using paired t-tests. Results demonstrated significant pre-post learning outcomes in both research cycles. A third research cycle in the form of a summer extension program supported students as they implemented their local solutions. Conclusions highlight design principles for the successful creation of SSI curricular units centered on local environmental issues of interest to students, teachers, and stakeholders.
• Navigated learning: An approach for differentiated classroom instruction built on learning science and data science foundations
  by Nancy Butler Songer, Michelle R. Newstadt, Kathleen Lucchesi, and Prasad Ram
  • Abstract: Classroom teachers are often provided with instructional resources and assessment systems that dictate one pathway for every student's learning and evaluation. These practices remain common despite new affordances available through data-rich, emerging digital technologies that draw on data science and learning science foundations to complement and enhance traditional instruction. This paper presents a conceptual framework for Navigated Learning, a pedagogical approach that operationalizes learning principles using emerging ideas in artificial intelligence and data science, resulting in the continuous, real time generation of students' cognitive and noncognitive data to support a teacher's ability to utilize the system to customize instruction. The paper articulates the learning principles underlying the pedagogical approach and the features afforded by the Learning Navigator system. The paper concludes with two cases of very different implementation of Navigated Learning focused on fifth grade and ninth grade students learning of mathematics.
• How do interdisciplinary teams co-construct instructional materials emphasising both science and engineering practices? 
  by Tamara Galoyan and Nancy Butler Songer
  • Abstract: To build a sustainable future, science and engineering education programmes should emphasise scientific investigation, collaboration across traditional science topics and disciplines, and engineering design, including design and evaluation of solutions. While some research studies articulate the shifts that are needed to realise classroom learning emphasizing investigation and design, fewer research studies help us to understand how we codesign these instructional programmes, including how experts from different essential disciplines collaborate towards an interdisciplinary instructional programme. We adopted a qualitative case study design to address the research question, What is the process of team co-construction of instructional materials that emphasize learning through both science investigation and engineering design? The paper outlines the first year of our team co-construction activities involving the design, implementation, and evaluation of instructional materials for secondary science. Qualitative data included semi-structured interviews with nine team members and documentation in form of researcher field notes and learning artefacts. Two cycles of coding resulted in five major themes that served as the basis for the five-phase model of team co-construction of instructional materials. This study provides information on the kinds of partnerships and collaboration needed to realise instructional programmes for students’ study of the interdisciplinary STEM-based challenges of tomorrow.

Taking Action! Ebook

This ebook describes the solutioning approach used by Life Right Here and Everywhere. It also details how educators and curriculum designers can use this approach to create opportunites for students to generate solutions to local problems.