Science and technology are developing at a rapid pace, and new inventions mainly represented by digital technology, intelligent technology and biotechnology are emerging in endlessly. It is against this background that STEAM education came into being and has attracted more and more attention from countries around the world, becoming one of the most popular educational hot spots at the moment.

The "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan for Educational Informatization" released not long ago clearly states that it is necessary to actively explore the application of information technology in new education models such as interdisciplinary learning (STEAM education) and maker education. , focusing on improving students’ information literacy, innovation awareness and innovation ability. The Chinese Education Society also established the Science and Technology Innovation Education Alliance, which is committed to creating STEAM courses and evaluation systems with Chinese characteristics.

Breaking barriers to promote interdisciplinary integration

Prior to the emergence of STEAM education - "STEM" is now mentioned more often.

“STEM is the abbreviation for the four disciplines of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. It is a multi-disciplinary research field that is partial to science and engineering.” Beijing Normal University Yu Shengquan, executive director of the University's Advanced Innovation Center for Future Education, pointed out that the proposal of STEM was born out of the need for interdisciplinary integration of science and technology development in contemporary society.

Feng Zhigang, the principal of Shanghai Middle School, has also paid attention to "STEM" for a long time. In his view, "STEM education aims to promote the development of students' personality and potential through interdisciplinary and transboundary teaching activities; by emphasizing the foundation of mathematics It can cultivate the knowledge application ability in science, technology and engineering; improve humanistic quality through the practice of teamwork and other aspects to cope with the challenges faced in the future."

Later, "STEM" added an "A", "'A', that is, art. In a narrow sense, it refers to subjects such as art and music; in a broad sense, it includes art, music, society, Language and other humanities and arts.” Yu Shengquan said that although there are many related derivative concepts similar to art, their essence is basically the same, and they all emphasize cross-field and cross-disciplinary integration.

Liu Limin, president of the China Education International Exchange Association and former vice minister of the Ministry of Education, believes that STEAM education is not just education at a certain stage of education, but should be a comprehensive and systematic education. It is not a simple superposition of science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics knowledge, but the integration of these five disciplines into an educational paradigm, turning fragmented knowledge into an interconnected unified whole, helping students establish a reasonable knowledge system and competency architecture, which is a kind of action-based learning that tends to superimpose abilities and knowledge.

“It emphasizes more on the wide-area curriculum model and no longer emphasizes physics, chemistry or even science as independent subjects, but integrates science, technology, engineering and mathematics to form a structured curriculum System. The basic approach to integration is to form a coherent and organized curriculum through activities." Yu Shengquan said.

Specialized teaching hinders the development of STEAM education

The road ahead for STEAM is not an easy one.

Zhao Zhongjian, professor at the Institute of International and Comparative Education at East China Normal University and editor-in-chief of the "Primary and Secondary School STEM Education Series" frankly stated that the current widespread subject-based teaching in primary and secondary schools in my country and the overemphasis on subject scores have to a large extent hinder the effective implementation of curriculum integration and project-based learning. "At the same time, we train teachers according to different disciplines, and there are very few teachers who can truly integrate disciplines."

"Teachers who have adapted to subject-based teaching will also find it difficult to adapt to the interdisciplinary requirements of STEAM education. ." Feng Zhigang further added.

“In addition, how to evaluate students is also a difficult problem before us. Since the evaluation standards for students’ participation in STEAM education have not yet been established, the evaluation of tendencies in this area has not yet been better incorporated. The existing comprehensive quality evaluation system needs to establish 'encouragement' evaluation parameters." Feng Zhigang pointed out that a school's education and teaching resources are limited, and the interdisciplinary nature of STEAM education requires the school to integrate and share resources on a larger scale. However, existing social resources, such as scientific and technological enterprises, universities and research institutes, are not yet sufficiently involved in STEAM education.

“At present, some schools do not have good interdisciplinary integrated design, and lack situation-based knowledge transfer, application and transformation. In the end, they have turned into vocational education, organizing students to play racing cars and high-tech equipment, and have become In order to cultivate students' interest in operational skills, or become another form of preparatory education, knowledge that primary and secondary school students should not master is swarmed into primary and secondary school classrooms," Yu Shengquan said frankly.

Change the role of teachers and reform traditional teaching methods

How to solve the problems before us?

Feng Zhigang, who has been working on the front line of the school all year round, believes that the school can find breakthroughs from three aspects: first, create "special classes" to drive the development of the whole school; second, establish the school's own evaluation system. Pay attention to the evaluation based on students' personality, expertise, academic interests, etc., and incorporate the practice of STEAM education into the evaluation system to further stimulate students' innovative potential; third, strengthen the "connection between universities and middle schools" and sow the seeds of "science" throughout the campus. Invite academicians, professors, etc. to the campus to teach, and at the same time provide convenience for students to go out.

Zhong Binglin, President of the Chinese Education Society, pointed out that you can try to use STEAM courses as special elective courses to provide students with different interests and hobbies with opportunities to participate in different projects to stimulate students' learning interest and creativity; you can also try to use STEAM courses as special elective courses. STEAM education is integrated into the school's daily teaching, providing students with opportunities for independent exploration in subject course teaching, allowing them to understand the connections and intersections between subjects and appreciate the practical value of knowledge.

“At the same time, we must change the role of teachers and reform traditional teaching methods.” Zhong Binglin emphasized that in the practice of STEAM education, the role of teachers has changed from traditional knowledge imparters to guides and facilitators of student learning. A new type of learning partnership is formed with students. Teachers must be able to guide students to use their respective strengths, make independent attempts, and construct knowledge structures through project-based learning; through independent and cooperative learning, they can experience a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment that is difficult to achieve through traditional classroom teaching.