Curriculum Unit Research Articles

On the Nature and Utility of Crosscutting Concepts

The crosscutting concepts (CCCs) are a collection of ideas that span the science and engineering disciplines. While various standards documents have identified similar sets of ideas in the past, calls for their explicit inclusion into science and engineering instruction began in earnest only about a decade ago. When these calls began, the research base on the teaching and learning of the CCCs was limited; in the intervening years, educators have debated whether and how the CCCs are useful for supporting science and engineering learners. In this article, we summarize a recent scholarship that has clarified the role of CCCs in supporting science and engineering learning. Then, we highlight two exemplary curricular units (one elementary and one secondary) that showcase CCC-informed instruction. Based upon these research and development efforts, we identify three core messages: (1) CCCs provide learners with a set of complementary lenses on phenomena, (2) CCCs are powerful tools for broadening access to science and engineering, and (3) practitioner innovations play an especially important role in the time-sensitive work of establishing a more robust research base for how CCCs can strengthen science and engineering teaching and learning.

Improving identification, reporting, and treatment of trafficked persons

This article provides resources for HCPs encountering individuals trafficked for sex work to improve their practice and care of them, pointing out that these resources can be used in the development of curricular units for HCP students.

Developing health literacy events: a case study of teachers designing health curricula

Objective: In response to the question ‘how can teachers develop health literacy events that leverage students’ cultural and linguistic resources’, this study highlights how two teachers developed a culturally and linguistically responsive curriculum that sought to promote health literacy. Design: The study details findings from a larger partnership between an urban university and a bilingual urban school in the USA. Researchers and teachers conducted a year-long project oriented towards co-designing a curriculum that integrated students’ cultural and linguistic repertoires with health literacy. Over one academic year, teachers planned, implemented, studied and modified curricular units that drew on students’ cultural and linguistic resources related to health. Setting: The study focuses on two Spanish-English bilingual teachers working in a third-grade (8–9 year olds) dual-language classroom in a multilingual urban community in the midwestern USA. Method: Data collected included classroom conversations, teacher-researcher and university researcher conversations, classroom work and teacher-derived analytic documents. Data were coded and analysed to understand how teachers made sense of what happened within specific health literacy events to develop a single descriptive case study. Results: Three events are focused on demonstrating how teachers developed health literacy by building on students’ pre-existing cultural and linguistic resources. Teachers moved from using teacher-centred forms of nutrition education to using student-developed health content that articulated with health concerns in the community. Conclusion: Using a funds of knowledge approach to integrating health literacy into the curriculum, teachers helped students draw on cultural and linguistic resources, building self-confidence, and developing an interest in gathering evidence and presenting health-related findings.

The Application of Constructive Alignment Theory in Designing a Curriculum Unit in Information Systems

The Application of Constructive Alignment Theory in Designing a Curriculum Unit in Information Systems

The Role of Higher Education Institutions (HEI) in Academic Spin-off Creation: A Cooperation Perspective

Cooperation between Higher Education Institutions and Enterprises (HEI-E-C) is extremely relevant in regional economic development. Therefore, this study aims to understand the role of HEI in academic spin-off creation. To achieve this objective, we adopted the qualitative approach (case study method) and focused on a cooperation relation involving a Portuguese HEI and two academic spin-offs. For data collecting, several interviews with key informants and direct observation were used. Content analysis of the interviews with founders of these academic spin-offs and lecturers teaching the curricular unit of entrepreneurship in the HEI studied, the results identified some essential aspects to understand this type of cooperation (HEI-E): (1) the role of academic entrepreneurship and its importance in the growth of spin-offs for regional economic growth, (2) the influence of academic entrepreneurs’ characteristics in the process of creating a spin-off, and (3) academic motivations to create spin-offs and the benefits of cooperation with HEIs. This study also presents implications for theory and educational and business practice.

Learning and teaching trans-inclusive language and register hybridity for multilingual writers

In multilingual instructional spaces, language use can reinforce or ­disrupt gender disparities. This self-study, situated in the context of a university developmental English writing course, examines how an instructor sought to raise L2 learners’ critical language awareness, operationalized as consciousness of ways that gender disparity is mediated by and through language. It also explores how one L2 Chinese learner, Wesheng, explored transgender themes and register during a curricular unit in this course. Focusing on Wesheng’s written and oral discourse, we illustrate the process through which his instructor developed a deeper understanding of his register-use. Data sources include writing samples, curricular materials, the instructor’s journal and feedback, and a semi-structured learner interview. Analyzing these sources through register and performance perspectives, we show how the learner exhibited hybridity in ‘en-gendered’ and academic registers of English and performed egalitarian and multilingual voices as he interacted with instructional resources. We conclude the article with discussions on the affordances of using register analysis to support critical language writing pedagogies and instructional strategies that teachers can use to cultivate L2 students’ socio-sexual literacies.

Race, History, and the Politics of the Local

Detailing a collaboration between middle school students and undergraduate students to create a local civil rights public art/public history project, this essay explores the promises and pitfalls of public historians working in their communities. The Martin Luther King Jr. Day Civil Rights curriculum unit was part of the more extensive People’s History of Geneva K–12 Curriculum Project, designed to bring the voices and experiences of underrepresented groups into the city’s history and its classrooms. This essay details the curriculum unit’s creation and implementation, paying particular attention to three contexts that served to center whiteness in the project’s development and implementation.

Riscos & Desafios (Risk & Challenges) Program in pandemic times: the students’ voice

Background: Preventive interventions are important to delay the onset of high-risk behaviors for young people's health. Regarding emerging adulthood, successful preventive programs are important to avoid high-risk alcohol consumption among university students. Riscos & Desafios (Risk & Challenges) Program is an extracurricular, comprehensive, and multi-component competence enhancement-based preventive intervention designed for students attending the first year of higher education. Goals: This paper aims to give voice to the procedural assessment made by students and to describe the implementation of the Program at the Faculty of Sport of the University of Porto in the second semester of the 2019/2020 school year. This implementation of a previous validated program was innovative twofold, since it has a curriculum infusion format through an optional curricular unit, and because it was developed during the period of lockdown due to COVID-19 pandemic.Methods: This is a mixed-method study that focus on the implementation of the Riscos & Desafios Program during the second semester of 2019/20 academic year. This evaluation of the Riscos & Desafios Program was done with a post-program survey, followed by univariate analysis of frequency. Complementary, an inductive analysis of qualitative data of student’s reflexive reports was carried out, using the QSR-NVIVO 12®.Results: Twenty-three first-year students who participated in the Riscos & Desafios Program constituted the target group of the intervention. Most of the participants were male (n=16) aging between 17 to 21 years. Most attended all the eight sessions and 96% of them participated in seven or more sessions. At the end of the implementation, 23 post-program filled-in questionnaires, and 18 structured reflection reports, were obtained. Most of the students rated the program as very good. Several categories emerged from the thematic analysis of the 18 reports, namely (1) perceived competencies, developed in the program, including the promotion of the social support network, interpersonal and communication skills, problem-solving skills, and their importance, as factors to protect against the development of risk behaviors, (2) personal positive impacts of the program attendance and (3) gains and losses with the transition to online learning format.Discussion: Students’ considerations about the experience with the Riscos & Desafios Program not only reinforced the importance and pertinence of this experience in their life trajectory, but also brought to light its relevance at this pandemic moment.

Integrating expertise for teaching conservation science to cultural heritage conservation students – A closer look at radiation, colour and museum lighting topics

AbstractIntroduction to Conservation Science (ICS) is a curricular unit (CU) from the bachelor’s degree in Conservation-Restoration at NOVA School of Science and Technology. This CU was created in 2017 to fill a gap in the academic degree – the need for a bridge between fundamental sciences (1st year) and conservation-restoration diagnosis (3rd year). For this reason, ICS was designed with the main goal of teaching 2nd year students how to look at, approach and solve problems of Cultural Heritage, through the combination of reflexive thinking and object-led analysis. ICS was first designed by an expert in Conservation Science with academic background in physics. However, from the perception of the students’ struggle to understand the purpose of ICS subjects to their future professional activity, a professor with expertise in Conservation and Restoration was invited in 2019 to work together in the re-design of the CU, through an integrated approach between the two experts. ICS was then revised with the introduction of new perspectives and topics, as well as new communication routes to students. This work highlights this partnership as a good practice methodology to involve conservation-restoration students into science, focusing on the ICS classes specifically dedicated to radiation, colour, and museum lighting.

Bop or Flop?: Integrating Music and Data Science in an Elementary Classroom

The importance of data literacies and the shortage of research surrounding data science in elementary schools motivated this research-practice partnership (RPP) between researchers and teachers from a STEM elementary school. We used a narrative case study methodology to describe the instructional practices of one music teacher who co-designed a data science curricular unit during a summer professional development program and implemented it in her 5th-grade music classroom. Data collected for this study include in-person and video observations, reflective journals, artifacts, and interviews. Findings suggest that this teacher integrated data science literacies into her classroom by supporting multiple avenues for data storytelling and relying on learners’ everyday discourse and experiences. Our study details a practical example of implementing data science with non-STEM domains in elementary classrooms.

The effect of two methods of ballistic resistance training on some aspects of upper body strength in the long jump for Specialized School athletes

The importance of the current study lies in it conducting a comparison between two training methods of ballistic resistance for the school athletes specialized in the long jump. The first method use the medical balls with different weights, while the second method use the ballistic tapes with different resistances on the basis of the original tape length and its percentage of stretching. The goal of the research is to explore the effects of these two methods to develop specific aspects of the muscular strength of the arms. The study sample was intentionally selected from the Specialized School athletes for gifted and strong saliva in the long jump Nineveh Branch, which numbered 10 athletes, and was divided randomly into two experimental groups with (5) athletes for each group. Equivalence was made for the two study groups in my tests (explosive force, and the distinctive force of velocity for the arms). The probability value appeared respectively (0.608) and (0.667), which is not significant, indicating that the two groups are equal. The ballistic resistance curriculum was initially implemented as part of the main section of the trainer curriculum unit for a period of 9 weeks. The sample conducted the tests in the pre and post measurements (the test of throwing a medical ball with the arms to the farthest distance), (and the test of throwing the medical ball against the wall at a distance of (1.5 m) continuously for 10 seconds) The results of the study showed that there were significant differences in favor of the ballistic tapes, with a marked improvement in the explosive power and the force characterized by the velocity of the arms. The study concluded that the method of ballistic resistance using tapes is distinguished from the method of using medical balls.The study focused in its recommendations on long jump trainers to use ballistic style exercises with tape for the arms at the end of the special preparation period and to combine them with the trainer's training program.

Competencias de información y alfabetización digital en una licenciatura virtual

The article explores the perception of undergraduatestudents at a public state university in Mexico, regarding their experience after completing the Multimodal Transversal Learning Unit Information and Digital Literacy. The research explores two aspects: self-perception of students regarding their level of achievement in specific digital competencies and main learning outcomes after completing the course. It also reports their assessment in five aspects: syllabus, educational resources, learning activities, coverage of the cross-cutting themes throughout the course, as well as operation of the Learning Management System and technical support. The research was quantitative, through a survey applied to 16 students in the first group that completed the curricular unit. Among the results, the following are reported: perceived levels of achievement in different competency indicators, best valued competencies, and overall assessment of the course by the students. The highest levels of achievement reported are in indicators associated with the students’ daily practices interests. The lowest levels of achievement are in the areas of algorithmic understanding and the generation of original contributions and digital content.

A socioscientific issues approach to ninth-graders' understanding of COVID-19 on health, wealth, and educational attainments.

This study investigated the implementation of a curricular unit of instruction designed to immerse rising ninth-grade students socioscientific issues via data collection and analysis of the relationships between health, wealth, educational attainment, and the impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on their communities. Twenty-six (n = 26) rising ninth-grade students (14-15 years old; 16 girls, 10 boys) participated in an early college high school program operated by the College Planning Center at a state university in the northeastern United States. The findings of this study demonstrate how ninth-graders enhanced their understanding of the relationships between COVID-19 and community health, wealth, and educational attainments. The students also identified from their research data that communities in Massachusetts that are more educated and with more financial resources were less impacted less by the virus.

Learning Outcomes of Particle Physics

In recent years, many researches and experiments have been carried out in the field of particle physics in our world, and important results have been achieved. The results of the research are transferred to the field of education, the curricula and the books taught are updated. The subject of particle physics is given in the 4th unit of the High School Physics Curriculum. In the study, particle physics learning outcomes given in the Introduction to Atomic Physics and Radioactivity unit were examined scientifically and educationally. With the document analysis method, one of the qualitative research methods, the subjects and achievements given in the relevant unit were determined first. Then, the quantitative and qualitative status, scientific and educational features and actuality of the learning outcomes were evaluated. Then, it was compared whether the achievements were compatible with the program objectives. At the end of the research, it was seen that the learning outcomes were aimed at teaching knowledge, scientific skills and competencies were secondary, the suggested teaching methods and techniques were inadequate, and the outcomes met the program objectives at a limited level. For an effective particle physics teaching in our country, it has been suggested that the high school physics curriculum should be updated, the learning outcomes should be compatible with the program, and the numerical, scientific and educational aspects should be determined well. In addition, it is recommended to focus on skills such as research, experiment, observation, classification, comparison and questioning in the teaching process, and to benefit from information and communication technologies with current methods and techniques.

Developing STEM Curriculum Units to Engage 4th-8th Grade Navajo Students as Part of In-Class Outreach

The Native American Astronomy Outreach Program (NAAOP) at Lowell Observatory is an in-class STEM enrichment program that pairs astronomers with 4th-8th grade teachers at Native-serving schools in northern Arizona. The astronomer works with the teacher to present hands-on astronomy activities to their class with the goal of getting students excited about STEM and STEM careers. Over three school years (2018-2021), a special collaboration with teachers at the Navajo Nation’s Kayenta Unified School District was used to develop and implement curriculum units for each grade level with potential for a high impact on students. The curriculum used Project Based Learning to better enable students to see themselves as scientists, and it included cultural and local connections related to the science content to encourage students to see science as relevant to themselves. Although impacted by the COVID19 pandemic, student surveys suggest that these curriculum units along with other aspects of the program had a positive impact on students’ interest in STEM.

Investigating social studies teachers’ implementation of an immersive history curricular unit as a cybernetic zone of proximal development

This qualitative study presents 27 students’ insights about four teachers’ implementation of an immersive Native American history curricular unit designed to equip students with digital skills to critically navigate complex, polarizing social issues. The Digital Civic Learning (DCL) curriculum used Google Suite and Google Classroom or Schoology to provide collaborative slides supporting immersive 2D-graphics, children’s books/resources, immersive activities/artefact-creation, and multimodal tools (e.g., discussion posts, Flipgrid video-essays). Teachers regulated student thinking/behavior towards cohesive outcomes, and encouraged open-ended exploration, operationalizing the design framework as a zone of proximal development (ZPD). The history unit incorporates four cybernetic design features (DF) that enable teachers to steer student-centered collaboration within the curricular unit. The teacher serves four diverse roles (guide, facilitator, modeler, participant observer) mapping onto the DF. Results of focus group interviews with students, which were analyzed based on a theory-informed coding scheme and narrative inquiry, suggest ways for social studies teachers to operationalize the DCL immersive history unit as a cybernetic ZPD by adapting its basic structure to technologies accessible in their schools by adapting its basic structure to technologies accessible in their schools.

Brain-based Learning Principles in the Science Curricula Content of the Basic Education Stage in the Sultanate of Oman: An Analytical Study

The study aimed to identify the level of including the principles of brain-based learning in the content of Oman science curricula for grades (5-8). The study followed the analytical method. The analyses included two units of the science curriculum for each grade from grades 5 to 8 in government schools for the academic year 2020/2021. The total number of units was 16 including the student’s book and the activity book for the first and second semesters. An analysis card was designed for the content of science curricula. Experts in the field verified the validity of the instrument. The reliability was obtained using inter-rater and test-retest methods. The results showed that the twelve principles of brain-based learning were included in the content of Omani science curricula for grades 5 to 8 with varying proportions. The results also indicated statistically significant differences in including the standards of the principles of brain-based learning among the grade levels. The percentage of including these standards in each grade was different from the other grades. The rate of including principles increased with the progression of the school level. There is consistency and continuity in including the standards of the principles of brain-based learning across grades at the school level covered by the current study. The study recommended taking advantage of the list of indicators of brain-based learning principles when developing the books of basic education 2. Keywords: brain-based learning principles, science curricula, grades (8-5(, Oman, Analytical Study.

ICT tools as resources for the evaluation of curricular content in undergraduate students

Evaluation refers to a continuous process that is essential for teaching and learning. Throughout history, various strategies and techniques have been adopted based on evaluation standards and the objectives to be achieved. Currently, after the COVID-19 pandemic, ICTs have been an essential tool for educational institutions. In spite of the climate of distrust created by the use of these tools, the professors of the University of Guayaquil of the Information Technologies career, have been forced to use them as a method of teaching and evaluation of curricular contents in response to the needs of the educational community. Therefore, this study uses a descriptive documentary type approach of applied field and as an instrument the survey technique was applied, having as a sample of 28 teachers, this was done with the purpose of making a comparative analysis, use and importance of ICT as an essential tool for the evaluations of the curricular units aligning with the functional criteria of formative and summative evaluation during the online classes.

Designing an Equity-Centered Framework and Crosswalk for Integrated Elementary Computer Science Curriculum and Instruction

As computer science (CS) education becomes more prevalent in K-12 instruction, it is critical for educators, researchers, and curriculum developers to identify culturally responsive and pedagogically inclusive approaches that can increase participation, access, and feelings of belonging for students from historically marginalized communities. In response, we developed an equity-centered curricular framework and illustrative crosswalk that synchronizes three distinct pedagogical approaches: culturally responsive pedagogy (CRP), Universal Design for Learning (UDL), and project-based learning (PBL). We describe the framework’s theoretical underpinnings and explain how this framework informed the development of an integrated elementary science+CS curricular unit and provide examples of its implementation. Next, we describe the relationship between our framework, the integrated curricular unit, and educative materials designed to help teachers use the lessons and transform their practice. Finally, we highlight the framework’s potential for broader implementation in the quest to promote equitable CS instruction grounded in the experiences and perspectives of diverse student populations. The crosswalk is a graphical representation of the framework that communicates relationships amongst the elements in a digestible and practical way. This Equity-Centered Curricular Crosswalk addresses both lesson features and teacher practices, to underscore our belief that the responsibility of equity-based pedagogy should not be solely borne by teachers. As educators, researchers, and curriculum developers consider their interconnected roles and responsibilities in the enactment of CRP and UDL, the crosswalk provides an important link between equity-based instructional theories and the realities of classroom practices.

Co-creation design thinking process: Learning with demola approach

Nowadays we witness numerous partnerships and projects of national and international scope around active training, using digital tools and based on co-creation processes between different partners, to obtain more creative and appropriate processes to respond to current and future scientific, academic and professional challenges. This article presents the participation of a group of professors from Instituto Politécnico de Setúbal (IPS) in the DEMOLA® approach to be trained as facilitators. We present the objectives, the formation of the teams and the established work methodology, and the application of this methodology adapted to the curricular unit of Process Optimization of the Master of Biological and Chemical Engineering. We briefly describe the main phases that constitute the development of the project within the scope of IPS and the obtained results from the analysis of all components (student training, professors, challenges with companies/organizations and perceptions of the whole team). We emphasize the development of instrumental skills (Canva, Miro, PESTLE, Portfolio); scientific/ pedagogical skills (Teamwork, Multiprofessional Approach, Co-creation Processes, Design Thinking, Research, Facilitation, Disruptive Thinking and Co-construction, among others); and “win-win” situations, or rather “learn-learn” between facilitators and students, innovation, intergenerational, sustainability and freedom of thought.