ED 5610 - STEAM Education: Integration, Challenge, and Curiosity

At one time or another we have all had to enter into a curriculum by which we were slightly frightened. Whether it’s due to a lack of content knowledge, limited experience, or simply because we’re creatures of habit we have all stressed over how to incorporate new subject areas. In addition to the stress we feel due to change, there will always exist time constraints. Throughout this course we will explore the nature of STEAM and discuss and practice methods used to employ multiple facets of science in our elementary classrooms. Too often quality inquiry-based science is overlooked in the classroom and oftentimes there are simple ways to connect our current curriculum to meaningful real world experiences for our students. Whether through lab experiences, off-site exploration, or utilizing technology to create virtual experiences for our students we can all find ways to enjoy more exploratory science in our classrooms. We will begin by sharing some of the restraints we experience around STEAM education, explore best practice around science instruction, and finally transition into developing methods to encourage our students and our peers to get meaningful science back into our classrooms. (3 credits)