Research On STEM Teaching Case Under The Perspective Of Fostering Interdisciplinary Competencies

The Core Competencies and Values for Chinese Students’ Development is centered on cultivating “a full-developed person” and construct a system which includes six major competencies.It reflects the direction of education comprehensive reform in China.Almost at the same time,in the practical field of education,STEM education has developed in China.Both of STEM eduation and core competencies have interdisciplinary characterastics,which becomes a point of convergence in this research.STEM education can be one of the ways to cultivate interdisciplinary competencies,and the latter can be the aim of STEM education.Therefore,from the perspective of interdisciplinary competencies cultivation,this study intends to explore the effective teaching methods of STEM education,in order to provide STEM teachers theoretical and practical reference to carry out STEM teaching.On the basis of literature research,the researcher develops the research ideas,and constructs the frameworks of STEM competencies and STEM teaching cases analysis.The four district-level open courses of a primary school——S school were selected as the analysis object of this study.The researcher collects data through classroom observations and video recordings,then watches and transcribes the video,and deals with relevant statistics.In the process,from the perspective of qualitative researchers,the researcher analyzes the discourse and behavior of teachers and students,the teaching situations and resources,etc.Following the way of evaluative case analysis,this study describes the four cases and analyzes the characteristics in four dimensions: subject and time arrangement,learning process,resources and materials,and learning evaluation.Based on the analysis,it is found that the selected cases can meet the requirements of interdisciplinary competencies cultivation in four aspects:(1)realizing subject integration in the form of “main subject + auxiliary subject”,(2)giving space for student autonomy and cooperation in the big activities,(3)using context to link stu-dents’ experience and current issues,(4)mobilizing teachers’ and students’ study by developing resource and materials.However,there are also some shortcomings.Firstly,the deep understanding of student autonomy is lacking.Secondly,the relationship between products and learning has not yet been clarified.Thirdly,learning places are still limited to functional classrooms.Fourthly,there is no systematic and scientific learning evaluation.For the factors that are not suitable for interdisciplinary competencies development,the reseacher tries to put forward some teaching suggestions.First,the STEM education goal system should be supported by interdisciplinary and disciplinary competencies.Second,teachers’ theoretical understanding and practical strategies about student autonomy should be deepened;Third,the focuses should be shifted from learning products to wonderful ideas.Fourth,STEM interdisciplinary learning should be fully supported with learning resources and materials.Fifth,a scientific STEM learning evaluation tool should be developed.