Cultural Border Crossing in Rural Communities: A Narrative Exploration in Teaching Middle School Science

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session Six
  In Roundtable Session: Identity, Inquiry, and Science Education (Table 5)

Abstract

As rural communities are also becoming more diverse. The increase of student diversity in classrooms brings culturally and linguistically rich experiences that can become challenging for rural teachers, particularly meeting students’ needs and understanding their cultures and experiences. This instrumental case study focuses on middle school science and engineering teaching in rural classrooms in an attempt to understand how rural science teachers make STEM accessible to their students. We collaborated with Mr. Jordan (pseudonym) to understand how he supported rural students from low socioeconomic backgrounds to cross cultural borders in learning science and engineering. Findings from this study highlights specific strategies that a veteran rural teacher utilizes to support students from diverse backgrounds to learn and engage with school science.

Authors

• Khanh Tran, Purdue University
  Presenting Author

• Selcen Guzey, Purdue University
  Presenting Author