Leveraging Culturally Nurturing Pedagogies to Cultivate Community-Oriented Integrated STEM in Middle Schools

• In Event: Equity and Representation in Science Education

Abstract

This work presents culturally nurturing pedagogy as a theoretical and practical possibility for K-12 integrated STEM education. Situating our conception of the shortcomings of culturally sustaining pedagogy, we critique how learning and doing science contradicts culturally sustaining science practices, especially for students who might not subscribe to Eurocentric ideologies and values. Furthermore, we emphasize a movement towards an onto-epistemological landscape that reflects the multiple realities and sense-making of science learning. This work highlights one of three dimensions of culturally nurturing pedagogies–STEM integration as the catalyst to community and social transformation. We contextualize this dimension through the Urban Heat Island curriculum, an Earth science unit focusing on extreme heat and students’ community and agency.
 

Authors

• Lynn A. Bryan, Purdue University

• Khanh Tran, Purdue University