Although STEM education is inarguably essential in today’s educational environment, it’s not always seamlessly incorporated into early childhood education. The barriers to include it are also more pervasive than many educators might realize.
The NSF-funded report, STEM Starts Early: Grounding Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math Education in Early Childhood, is the product of an effort by the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop and New America to respond to those educators’ concerns about STEM education.
Because many parents have anxieties around teaching math and science concepts to their children, or because they themselves have missed out on those learning opportunities, they need support in order to encourage their children.
The report outlines five key findings in the STEM education landscape.
1. Parents and teachers are both enthusiastic and capable of supporting STEM learning, but require more knowledge and support to do so effectively.
2. Teachers in early childhood environments need more training and professional development to effectively engage young children in developmentally appropriate STEM learning.
3. Parents and technology help connect school and home to support STEM learning.
4. Research and public policies play a critical role in the presence and quality of STEM learning in young children’s lives, and a dialogue must be kept between them.
5. A strategic communications effort is needed to convey an accurate understanding of developmental science to the public.
STEM education at the preschool level should be prioritized, according to this report. It recommends these steps:
1. Engage Parents: Parent confidence and efficacy should be their children’s first and most important STEM guides.
2. Support Teachers: Improve training and institutional support for teaching early STEM.
3. Connect Learning: Support and expand STEM learning that is available to children.
4. Transform Early Childhood Education: Build a sustainable and aligned system of high quality learning from birth through age 8.
5. Reprioritize Research: Improve the way early STEM research is funded and conducted.
6. Overall: Use insights from communications science to build public will for and understanding of early STEM learning.
The report states, creating opportunities to excite children with STEM as early as possible can and should be accomplished with a combination of large and small steps.