Promoting Language and STEAM as Human Rights in Education: Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics

273 Pages·2019·5.261 MB·

by  Zehlia Babaci-Wilhite

Zehlia Babaci-Wilhite    Editor
Promoting
Language and
STEAM as Human
Rights in Education
Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts
and Mathematics
Promoting Language and STEAM as Human Rights
in Education
Zehlia Babaci-Wilhite
Editor
Promoting Language
and STEAM as Human
Rights in Education
Science, Technology, Engineering,
Arts and Mathematics
123
Editor
ZehliaBabaci-Wilhite
University of California Berkeley
Berkeley, CA, USA
and
SanJose State University
SanJose, USA
ISBN978-981-13-2879-4 ISBN978-981-13-2880-0 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2880-0
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2018957646
©SpringerNatureSingaporePteLtd.2019
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This book is dedicated to the memory of
Hamama Babaci, who has been a significant
person in social justice and valued education
of the vulnerable in the world.
Foreword I: Education, Knowledge
and Empowerment
A child speaks the language of her culture at home. They know a lot about their
own bodies, the names of the different parts, and their connections. They already
knowaboutfood,chewing,digestion,andtheseparationofnutrientsandwaste,the
nutrients absorbed in the body and the waste expelled. If they come from farming
communities,theywillhaveknownalotaboutplantsandanimals.Theysee,hear,
smell, touch, and name what’s around them, and react accordingly. They probably
have created songs, stories or even drawn pictures of what is around them. Most
important, they have a library of names to describe all this. Language names the
world around us and stores the knowledge of the names and the named.
WheninschooltheyencounterEnglishoranylanguageofeducationthatisnot
the mother tongue, they suddenly hear terms like anatomy, physiology, the
digestive system, and suddenly, what was an integral part of their experience,
sounds splendidly mental and strange.
It is the same with other experiences. From the very beginnings of their life
journey, children learn that they can reach an object a little distant from them by
using a stick,or if somethinghigher, they draga chair andstand on it. They make
things to help them reach other things. They make imitation cars, airplanes, and
they have names for what they do and the things that help them do it.
Then,theygotoschool,andinalanguagedivorcedfromtheonetheyhadused
tonamewhattheymake,theyareconfrontedwithwordslikeScience,Technology,
Engineering, and Mathematics. For instance, every child will have known how to
count, add, divide, because they have often fought with their siblings over equal
share ofgifts. Toresolve theconflict, theycount,they puttheminlittle piles,they
take away some, and add some. They may even make marks on paper or on the
ground to represent the various piles. In some games, they may mark the territory,
and they resolve disputes about distance by measuring.
But when they go to school, they are confronted with Mathematical terms like,
Multiplications, Division, Geometry, and Algebra. Instead of adding to what they
alreadyknowintheirownlanguage,learningbecomesaprocessofalienatingthem
from what they already experienced and named.
vii
viii ForewordI:Education,KnowledgeandEmpowerment
Knowledge is a continuous adding to and revising what we already know to
generate new knowledge that opens new possibilities. Such knowledge empowers.
But for most kids who have to abandon their mother tongue to learn in another
language, knowledge may confront them as a hostile force.
Education should mean knowledge as empowerment not alienation. Adding a
language to what one already knows is empowerment. Being made to abandon a
language that one already knows in order to acquire a new one is alienation.
The practical necessity of a common language of communication should never
mean the excommunication of all the other languages. This is the challenge of
education in science, technology, engineering, and Math, and all knowledge, in
multilingual situations, and this book, help us think about that challenge.
Irvine, USA Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o
University of California Irvine
Foreword II: Creativity and Social Justices
in STEAM Teaching and Learning
Environments
Focusing on creativity and social justice in all phases of teaching and learning
should not be viewed as an addition but as a necessary component. This book,
Promoting Human Rights in Education through STEAM, emphasizes the inter-
disciplinary nature of teaching and learning, based on the collaboration of
researchersandpractitioners sothatcreativityandsocialjusticefocusedpracticeis
supportedandnurtured.Thus,apriorityisteachingallstudentsbymovingfromthe
currently popular STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics)
construction, to a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and
Mathematics) environment that presents a solid base to integrate all disciplines
where education is precedent (Zimmerman, 2014) and fields of study keep their
integrity.Theintegrativeabilities oftheartspositionthemtoplayanessentialrole
in linking all subjects that are fundamental in diverse learning environments and
include creativity and social justice emphases (Efland, 1990; Gibson & Larson,
2007; Zimmerman, 2012).
Research and practice related to the everyday lives of students need to be
highlighted. It is important therefore to educate all students to use their imagina-
tionstosolveproblemsusingSTEAMskillsthatincludeartsactivitiesusingvisual,
aural,verbal,andsomaticthinking,tofacilitatedevelopmentoftheircreativityand
imaginations with just and fair relationships locally and in the world outside their
familiareducationenvironments(Zimmerman,2009,2010).Animportantgoalisto
promote interactions among many fields of study as to how pedagogy might be
adapted through trans-disciplinary disciplines (Bastos & Zimmerman, 2015).
Contemporary STEAM educators and researchers need to consider how creativity
research and practice can promote social justice in an age of collaboration and use
of new technologies and social media as aids in a process of preparing today’s
learners for universal citizenship using contemporary technologies to reinterpret
traditional forms, break boundaries, and use innovative types of social communi-
cation. New digital technological environments, through modes of mass media
communication, provide contexts where textural, aural, linguistic, spatial, and
ix
x ForewordII:CreativityandSocialJusticesinSTEAMTeaching…
visual resources can be presented through images, audios, video games, crowd
sourcing, social networks, and collaborative scholarship. This view supports
teaching and learning as socially constructed when students learn by participating
cooperatively and collaboratively, using new technological advances, and inter-
acting with one another across local, national, and international boundaries in
cyberspace (Shin, 2010; Tillander, 2011).
Research and practice, using STEAM initiatives, therefore need to be recon-
sidered with emphasis on development of cultural identity, technology, social
media communication, good citizenship, and consideration of complex realities
of the economic sector. Teaching and learning, through the intersection of these
factors, is shown to have power to transform our networked, interconnected world
tobededicatedtobuildingtolerance,equality,andequity.Acommunityofpractice
then results in which civic responsibility plays an important role and creativity is
viewed as providing valuable in-process experiences in which everyone has rights
toexpressionwithemphasisonincreasinglyequitablerelationshipsamongculture,
people, and economic activity (Bastos & Zimmerman, 2015). With a society-
centred approach to education, that focuses on how knowledge about the world
outside and beyond students’ own personal experiences are presented, processes
and products of culture then can be studied in a variety of contexts where social,
political,religious,economic,cultural,sexual,age-based,andracialorientationsare
taken into consideration.
With current emphasis in the USA on standardized pedagogical outcomes, the
necessity for injecting STEAM initiatives through inventiveness and fair and just
relationships between students and society is evident. All educators also should
consider developing educational interventions for their students, based on research
and practice, that fosters creative thinking and equity, justice, and, equality to
ensurethattheirstudentshaveaccesstomethodsofreadingideologicalcontentthat
is presented to them through traditional contemporary forms of communication
(Duncum, 2007). Although extrinsic goals may play an important role in how
creativity impacts education, intrinsic goals also perform a significant function in
which the arts can make important contributions to new STEAM initiatives. With
anintrinsicfocus,students’ownfeelingsofaccomplishmentmeetingtheirownsets
ofoutcomescanbebroughttolightascontrastedwithextrinsicvalidation,suchas
meetingstateSTEMstandards,wheretheirworkisalignedwithevaluationcriteria
initiated by others. Through intrinsic, transformational experiences students are
encouragedtobecomeengagedintheirownlearningprocesses,settheirowngoals,
andtakerisksinbeingcreativeandinnovative.Generatingasupportiveeducational
environment where creativity and social equity prevails involves emphasizing
student meaning-making as a prolonged engagement with a problem; encouraging
being playful without constraints when working with materials; supporting risk
taking by experimenting with materials and ideas without fear of sanctions against
incorrect solutions, errors, or mistakes; and promoting deep involvement, passion,
and imagination (Zimmerman, 2005). The time is opportune now to embrace
ForewordII:CreativityandSocialJusticesinSTEAMTeaching… xi
creativity and social justice as important aspects of teaching and learning, so let’s
get some STEAM, and forge ahead to build integrated and equitable educational
environments for all students.
Bloomington, USA Enid Zimmerman
Indiana University Bloomington
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