Collaborative Research: Supporting Teacher Customizations of an Integrated Science, Engineering, and Computational Thinking Curriculum Unit

National frameworks for science education in the United States advocate for bringing science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and computer science (STEM+CS) disciplines together in K-12 classrooms. Although curricular materials are emerging to support STEM+CS integration, research demonstrates that teachers need support to engage students in authentic STEM+CS practices that leverage and sustain student and community assets. This project aims to support middle school teachers in their enactment of an integrated science, engineering, and computational modeling curriculum unit and understand how teachers customize computationally-rich, Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)-aligned curricular materials to their own schools and classrooms. Through this work, the project team seeks to develop a better understanding of the supports that teachers need to successfully adapt science curricular materials to different classroom, school, and community contexts. The project involves collaborating with school districts to implement the Water Resource Challenge (WRC), developed based on existing NSF-supported curricular materials, and revise it to enable customization for different teachers and school settings. As more NGSS-aligned STEM+CS materials are developed for teachers, this work is important for understanding how teachers adapt and customize curricular materials to meet the needs of their students. The project leverages a participatory design paradigm to engage middle school teachers in professional learning experiences focused on the development of STEM+CS curricular materials. Through design-based research, the project examines the kinds of support teachers need to customize STEM+CS curricular materials for their specific contexts. Researchers will investigate implementation integrity and explore factors that shape teachers' enactment and adaptation of STEM+CS curricular materials, including use and customization of educative materials and teacher guides, teacher characteristics (e.g., STEM+CS experience, beliefs, and perceptions of students), and classroom contexts (e.g., student assets and resources, community resources, district, and state requirements). Specifically, the project will investigate: (1) the kind of supports teachers need to be able to customize STEM+CS curricular materials; (2) how teachers customize and enact STEM+CS curricular materials in their classroom; and (3) students' learning of STEM+CS concepts and practices and their STEM+CS identity when teachers use customized and non-customized materials. The project will involve 18 teachers and impact up to 4,800 students in school districts in Virginia and Tennessee. Project outcomes include co-designed STEM+CS curricular materials, a computational modeling environment, and teacher resources to support STEM+CS integration in curricular materials and practice. The Discovery Research preK-12 program (DRK-12) seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) by preK-12 students and teachers, through research and development of innovative resources, models and tools. Projects in the DRK-12 program build on fundamental research in STEM education and prior research and development efforts that provide theoretical and empirical justification for proposed projects. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.