Facilitating Constructive Engineering Talk

Facilitating Constructive Engineering Talk (FACET) is a collaboration between the University of Nebraska Lincoln 4-H and the Tufts University Center for Engineering Education and Outreach. The researchers are studying educators’ talk within 4-H facilitated engineering design activities. Talk moves are a tool that educators can use to elicit learners’ engineering reasoning and sensemaking, encourage explorative learning, and support productive participation in engineering design. This study is using video observations and interviews to understand Nebraska 4-H Educators’ verbal interactions with small teams of rural eight- to twelve-year-old youth and the ways those interactions influence youths’ engineering participation and learning. The project will advance understanding of informal engineering education by exploring 1) pedagogical talk moves that 4-H Educators use to scaffold engineering learning by rural youths, 2) youths’ responses to educators’ talk, and 3) shifts in educators’ teaching as they co-create and participate in professional development. Ultimately, this work will lead to increased participation in engineering study by rural youth, which will lead to a more diverse engineering workforce. In every rural county of Nebraska, 4-H Educators facilitate out-of-school, choice-based, informal engineering learning in 4-H Clubs, libraries, and afterschool programs. 4-H Educators live in or near the communities they serve, closely know local families, and are well-positioned to facilitate culturally relevant engineering learning activities with local youth. Over four years, 4-H Educators and university researchers are collaborating to 1) observe and video record educators and youth engaging in researcher- and educator-developed engineering design activities, 2) interview educators and youth about these engineering teaching and learning experiences, and 3) co-create professional development resources for informal educators. Ultimately, the project will identify Educators’ talk move repertoires, develop understanding of connections between talk moves and youths’ subsequent engineering participation, and co-create and disseminate talk move-focused professional development resources to informal engineering educators. Products from this project include professional development workshops and free, online resources that support informal educators to learn and use talk moves to support youth in participating in and learning engineering. This Integrating Research and Practice project is jointly funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR). AISL seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. This includes providing multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in STEM learning experiences. 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.