PME-NA

Integrating Justice-Centered STEM Making into Classrooms

• In Event: Poster Session #2

Description

When coupled with justice-centered pedagogies, the maker movement has the potential to make STEM education more equitable (e.g., Barton et al., 2017; Vossoughi et al., 2016). Integrating justice-centered STEM making (JCSM) into classrooms requires teachers be trained on how to incorporate social justice into school makerspaces. Seventeen teachers participated in an instructional technology graduate course focusing on JCSM. At the conclusion of the course, teachers were asked to complete a retrospective pre-post survey to reflect on their growth related to integrating JCSM in their classrooms. All respondents (n = 16) shared that their experiences supported growth in their TPACK subscores, with the greatest growth in their integrated knowledge. Preliminary findings indicate that teachers felt more equipped to not only integrate JCSM into their own classrooms, but to also support their colleagues’ professional growth related to JCSM.

Authors

• Kimberly Chang Corum, Towson University

• Sandy M Spitzer, Towson University