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Everything Is Connected: Integrating Science and Engineering with Instruction in Other Subjects

When children learn science and engineering, they apply knowledge and skills from other subjects, regardless of whether the teacher explicitly calls attention to it. Children use language and literacy skills to write an explanation, label parts of a model, or argue based on evidence during a discussion. They employ mathematics to measure and compare quantities and graph data. They connect to social studies when they consider how an engineering design could affect potential users. They use computational thinking when they program the behavior of animals in a computer simulation. As they work in groups and follow classroom expectations, they also develop and draw on their social-emotional skills. In short, children’s minds and experiences are not compartmentalized by subject matter, like elementary school schedules often are.

You may already be explicitly integrating instruction in science and engineering instruction with the teaching of ELA or mathematics, social studies, computational thinking, or social-emotional learning. Effective integration involves more than making superficial connections between subjects or tacking on an incidental task from another content area. It goes beyond having students read books or passages about science topics during circle time or creating graphs during science investigations. Effective integration leverages the connections between subjects to energize learning in both areas while also attending to children’s learning in each subject. It’s a way

to bring to life one of the defining features of instruction based on investigation and design—connecting learning across content areas and contexts. When done well, an integrated approach in any one subject has been shown to actually improve learning in each of the subjects being taught.

This chapter focuses on approaches that integrate science and engineering with ELA and mathematics because these latter two subjects often receive the most instructional emphasis and time in preschool and elementary classrooms. To inform and inspire you, the chapter also includes examples of teachers who are implementing this kind of integration.

What does effective integration look like?

In a Title I K–5 school in a rural Midwestern district, a third-grade teacher, Chandra Bose, incorporates components of ELA to advance students’ learning during a unit that couples science investigation and engineering design. The unit is intended to help children understand the effects of different forces on the motion of objects and is centered on the driving question, How can we design fun moving toys that other kids can build? Throughout the unit, students make and test prototypes of moving toys, including the balloon rocket in the case below, and use them to investigate patterns of motion and the impact of forces like friction. Ms. Bose leads interactive read-alouds from pertinent fiction and nonfiction children’s books.

As you go through this case, note how Ms. Bose does more than just read the books. She alternates between text readings and hands-on tasks to build students’ knowledge and keep them motivated. She focuses on particular text passages to stimulate productive discussion and asks children to go back to a story to help them develop explanations after they have tested ways to make a balloon rocket move.

How does integration of multiple subjects benefit teachers and students?

Subject integration makes science and engineering instruction more authentic by mirroring how real scientists and engineers apply knowledge from other fields to their work. Effective integration also benefits teachers and students in other ways.

Subject integration builds on the strengths of preschool and elementary teachers

As a preschool or elementary teacher, especially in a self-contained classroom, you are likely responsible for children’s development and learning in all subjects. In the early years of schooling, teaching children to read, write, speak, and listen, and to do mathematics, are typically the main focus of your job. You clearly have expertise in these subjects—and that’s an asset for integrated instruction.

You probably already do some forms of integration, whether you label it that way or not. Children’s trains of thought don’t always fall into neat categories, and you sometimes need to address questions as they arise. For example, while reading the story of the three little pigs during an ELA block, a student might ask a question about the differences between brick, straw, and sticks—the materials the pigs used to construct their homes, with varying results. This question presents an opportunity for you to guide children to explore disciplinary core ideas related to properties of matter and the crosscutting concept of structure and its relationship to function as they reflect on why a brick house might stay standing longer than a stick house.

Subject integration can help address the problem of limited instructional time

You’re well aware of the importance of teaching reading and mathematics in the early years of education and the pressure teachers often feel to raise student achievement in these subjects. With the majority of instructional time in elementary schools devoted to ELA and mathematics, the time available for science and engineering at this level is meager, on average, and even less in preschool.

Carefully integrating instruction in ELA or mathematics with science and engineering can help address this time crunch—not by making indiscriminate cuts in ELA and mathematics time but by designing ways to use class time more strategically and connect content areas more thoughtfully.

Subject integration can motivate and support learners with different strengths and needs

When you incorporate ELA and mathematics into science and engineering, children aren’t just reading or calculating for its own sake. The goal of explaining a science phenomenon or design a solution to a problem provides a context and more compelling reason for applying ELA and mathematics practices. When children are reading, writing, or communicating about science or engineering materials and ideas that interest them, this can increase their motivation to persist through when these activities become more difficult.

Integrating other subjects with science and engineering also opens up additional ways for children to demonstrate their strengths and for you to address their needs. A fourth-grade student who struggles with some aspects of mathematics class may learn how to identify geometric shapes while designing a bridge. Marian Hobbes Moore, a STEM instructional coach, described how a “straight-backed and stern-faced” multilingual learner who seldom spoke in class found his voice while working on a project to create a solar oven:

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² Interview, Dec. 10, 2021.

³ Interview, Feb. 12, 2022.

What are some general principles for effective integration?

Whichever subjects you choose to connect, you may find it helpful to keep in mind the principles in Box 7-1 as you plan and implement integration.

Engage children in investigation and design experiences that draw on multiple subjects

Many domains of life intersect in real-world problems, which makes these problems a natural way to improve learning in multiple subjects. As you select phenomena for investigations and tasks for design, consider how they provide a context for or can be strengthened by knowledge and practices from other subjects. For instance, what kinds of mathematical concepts or practices might help children analyze data and notice patterns as they investigate phenomena? How can books or other texts set the stage for engineering activities or shed light on a science concept after an investigation? How can children share their findings through writing, and how can writing about science phenomena support their literacy learning?

Make integration explicit to students when designing classroom resources and teaching strategies

As you integrate activities, it’s productive to identify and keep in mind your learning goals for each of the subjects involved. If a subject like mathematics is playing a supporting role, it may help you to figure out whether there’s time in a lesson for children to draw on prior knowledge and skills and for you to provide scaffolding for those skills, if necessary. For example, if you have enough time, you may decide

to pause a discussion of a science model to, for instance, teach children some of the mathematics behind the model. Then you can fold the science back in after children understand the mathematics. If you don’t have time, you may need to quickly touch on the essential mathematics and then get back to focusing on modeling.

It can also be helpful to discuss with children the specific learning goals for each of the subjects in a lesson. If you’re introducing measurement into an investigation of plant growth, for example, you could list the measurement goals (today we’re going to learn how to use a yardstick and use the units on the yardstick to measure and compare length) as well as the science goals (we’re going to observe different patterns of plant growth and come up with explanations of things that may affect growth based on our evidence). This kind of explicit talk about goals can help children see how mathematics and science are mutually supportive.

Find meaningful, purposeful connections to other subjects

Because every subject is unique, with its own set of knowledge and practices, different subjects present different possibilities for integration. As you design and implement integrated instruction, you should incorporate strategies that honor the knowledge and practices of each subject and support children in learning them rather than spending time on superficial connections that could interfere with the learning goals. For example, in a unit that integrates science and history, you can support children in recognizing that work in both subjects involves backing up claims with evidence, but in different ways.

Recognize that more integration is not necessarily better

Each subject area has a body of knowledge and skills that develops coherently over time. Some of these knowledge and skills may be best taught separately during time reserved for that subject. For example, you might spend several days teaching students a reading or writing skill during ELA instruction. In the process, you can alert students that this skill will come in handy for an upcoming science or engineering project. Then you can spend several days helping them apply that skill to their current science or engineering work during science time.

How can I integrate ELA with science and engineering?

Language and literacy are a means to learning any subject and are essential to learning science and engineering. Whether children are recording observations, creating models, or constructing explanations and arguments, they are using one or more of

the ELA building blocks of speaking, listening, reading, and writing (or drawing).

Integrating ELA can deepen children’s understanding of science and engineering while also developing their language and literacy skills. Moreover, it can cultivate competencies common to both ELA and science and engineering, such as questioning, making inferences, gleaning information from texts, and summarizing information from multiple sources.

Science and engineering can be a rich and authentic context for developing the language proficiency of all learners, and particularly for multilingual learners (see Box 7-2).

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⁴ Interview, Feb. 3, 2022.

Reading texts in science and engineering instruction

In traditional instruction, many teachers have relied heavily on texts to teach the science content that children are expected to learn—and remember well enough to pass a test. In instruction for three-dimensional learning, texts still play a pivotal role, but the distinction lies in how and when you use them.

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⁵ Palincsar, A. S., Fitzgerald, M. S., DellaVecchia, G. P., & Easley, K. M. (2020). The integration of literacy, science, and engineering in prekindergarten through fifth grade. The National Academies Press; Lee, O., Maerten-Rivera, J., Penfield, R. D., LeRoy, K., & Secada, W. G. (2008). Science achievement of English language learners in urban elementary schools: Results of a first-year professional development intervention. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 45(1), 31–52; and Bravo, M. A., & Cervetti, G. N. (2014). Attending to the language and literacy needs of English learners in science. Equity & Excellence in Education, 47(2), 230–245.

The key is to use texts to support, rather than detract from, children figuring things out. This means using texts strategically in ways like these:

• Introduce a puzzling phenomenon or provide context for an upcoming investigation
• Present simple ideas that children will develop further when they investigate and design
• Offer another source of information to help build arguments
• Introduce or reinforce the scientific terms for concepts that children have begun to understand as a result of their previous investigations
• Connect what children are discovering to current events, related phenomena, larger ideas, or crosscutting concepts

And you’re not just limited to textbooks. Various types of nonfiction and fiction texts can serve these purposes quite well. A news article like the one about the damaged shipping container on the beach in Chapter 1 can introduce a puzzling phenomenon and spur children to notice and wonder. Storybooks like the one about children sharing a bedroom in the nightlights example in Chapter 3 can set up an investigation. Text passages like those on plant parts read during the wild backyard case in Chapter 4 provide a wealth of information that children can draw on to further their understanding, make sense of their findings, and rethink their explanations. And a children’s biography, like the one of Lonnie Johnson described earlier in the chapter, can provide a meaningful context while also enhancing representation (in this case) of engineers of color.

The following example shows how a teacher strategically incorporates readings from informational texts at key points during a third-grade unit on the properties of matter.

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⁶ Example based on Varelas, M., Pappas, C. C., Kane, J. M., Arsenault, A., Hankes, J., & Cowan, B. M. (2008). Urban primary-grade children think and talk science: Curricular and instructional practices that nurture participation and argumentation. Science Education, 92(1), 65–95. https://doi.org/10.1002/sce.20232

⁷ For teachers following the NGSS, this example is not aligned with the performance expectations for that grade level.

⁸ Varelas et al., 2008, p. 72.

Throughout an integrated activity, there are multiple times in which you can use texts to build on and further children’s science and engineering ideas. Table 7-2 summarizes strategies you can use before, during, and after reading a text to enhance children’s learning and connect it to larger concepts.

TABLE 7-2

HOW YOU CAN USE TEXTS TO BUILD ON AND FURTHER CHILDREN’S SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING IDEAS

Reading suitable texts as part of science and engineering instruction can fulfill another vital purpose—to reinforce children’s identities as scientists and engineers and see themselves represented in these fields. You may find the following suggestions helpful:

• Use texts to broaden the perspective of who does and uses science and engineering. Choose texts (and videos) that represent the identities and cultures of

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⁹ Fitzgerald, 2018, p. 189.

• children in your class and the larger society, with careful attention to groups that have been marginalized in science and engineering work. In addition to the Lonnie Johnson book described in the toys case above, children can read about figures as diverse as astronaut Mae Jemison, chimpanzee expert Jane Goodall, inventor Lewis Latimer, and animal behaviorist Temple Grandin, to name just a few. And don’t forget people who use science for societal goals, such as African reforestation advocate Wangari Maathai or protector of Indigenous waters Rachelle Figueroa.
• Choose books that show children doing science and engineering. In the Cece Loves Science series by Kimberly Derting and Shelli R. Johannes, for instance, Cece is constantly asking questions and developing investigations. In Jabari Tries by Gaia Cornwall, Jabari sets out to build a flying machine but gets frustrated when his first design doesn’t work; things go better after he brainstorms ideas with his dad and little sister. These kinds of readings create opportunities for children to discuss science and engineering practices and connect them to their lives, interests, and communities.
• Consider how science and engineering are portrayed in texts. Not all texts are aligned with a vision of science education that is anchored in investigation and design and emphasizes equity and justice. Look for books that don’t just convey facts or describe inventions, but that highlight the practices and trials that went into arriving at findings or solving problems.

In addition to reading, the ELA components of writing, drawing, and speaking can enrich science and engineering instruction when they are thoughtfully integrated. Chapters 4, 5, and 6 already include examples of how teachers have done this, and you can come up with many more creative possibilities.

How can I integrate mathematics with science and engineering instruction?

Mathematics is integral to science and engineering. When children do science and engineering, they see how useful mathematics can be in their daily lives. You can strengthen children’s appreciation for and understanding of mathematics by helping them use mathematics skills and concepts to investigate phenomena and solve problems that are interesting and relevant. In turn, applying mathematics allows children to deepen their understanding of science and engineering ideas.

Chapter 4 talked about two key uses of mathematics that can be readily inte-

grated into science and engineering lessons—measuring quantities or attributes; and organizing, interpreting, and representing data. Below are more detailed examples of how you can integrate measurement and data applications into science and engineering instruction.

Measurement in science and engineering instruction

As you incorporate measurement into science investigations and engineering tasks, there are several things to consider. The measurement experiences should strengthen children’s learning in mathematics as well as science and engineering. But the mathematics shouldn’t be so far beyond what children have learned that it’s discouraging. You’ll need to draw on your knowledge of how children develop an understanding of measurement. You may need to pause a science lesson to provide just-in-time instruction in the necessary mathematics skills and some scaffolding for children who are having difficulty.

Think of preschoolers discussing and investigating the conditions and resources that plants need to grow. To explore cause and effect, children might track growth over time as they water class plants and put them near windows to get sunlight.

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¹⁰ Llosa, L., Haas, A., Grapin, S., & Lee, O. (n.d.). Integrating science and language for all students with a focus on English language learners: A classroom example [Webinar]. https://www.nyusail.org/webinar-and-brief-5

Children may also compare the growth of different plants, or similar plants under different conditions such as plants located next to or away from a window. To conduct these investigations, children need to learn how to measure, regardless of whether they use a standard tool like a ruler or a nonstandard tool like a length of rope. They also need to figure out which measuring tools can help them observe, record, and compare changes over time. For example, is a ruler long enough to measure plants as they grow taller?

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¹¹ Dominguez, X., Vidiksis, R., Leones, T., Kamdar, D., Presser, A. L., Bueno, M., & Orr, J. (2023). Integrating science, mathematics, and engineering: Linking home and school learning for young learners. Digital Promise, Education Development Center, GBH. https://digitalpromise.dspacedirect.org/server/api/core/bitstreams/dd63fe27-fb4f-4cdb-b40a-a2c9342de88c/content

Data representation and analysis in science and engineering

You’ve probably done mathematics lessons in which children collect and graph data about their preferences, such as counting and graphing how many children in class like a specific fruit or are wearing certain clothes. In science investigations and engineering design, the data-related activities move beyond these basics and involve children looking for patterns and aggregating results across multiple cases. This allows children to deepen their understanding of both science and engineering and mathematics.

Recall Ms. Jafri, who first appeared in Chapter 4 as she guided her third graders through investigations of wild plants outdoors and fast-growing plants in the classroom.¹² To build on children’s developing knowledge of plants and measurement, Ms. Jafri asks her students to compare plants grown in three different conditions—sun only, sun and shade, and shade only. She wants the students to use their comparative data to reach conclusions about any variations they find in the plants’ growth across the three groups. She sees this as an opportunity to improve students’ understanding

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¹² Manz, E. (2015). Resistance and the development of scientific practice: Designing the mangle into science instruction. Cognition and Instruction, 33(2), 89–124.

of data representations, and particularly of line plots, which are part of her state’s third grade mathematics standards.

On day six of plant growth, Ms. Jafri asks the student to measure the heights of the plants in the three different conditions with a ruler and to record their data on index cards. Working in pairs, students decide how to organize and present their data. After they’re finished, Ms. Jafri guides the class in reviewing the different approaches used by pairs of students to display their comparisons of plant height. She asks students to consider which type of display best allows them to quickly see that on day 6, the plants in the shade were taller, in general. Two types of displays are shown in Figure 7-3. Ms. Jafri also supports children as they come up with explanations for why the shade plants tend to be taller—because these plants put their energy toward trying to grow upward to reach the sun.

In addition, Ms. Jafri has the children use TinkerPlots software to create a line plot displaying the heights of the plants (Figure 7-4). The children examine the line plot to see what findings emerge and how these findings connect with the other ways used to display the same data.

Don’t feel compelled to do this all at once!

Integration of various academic subjects must be carefully designed and implemented to make better use of instructional time and to deepen understanding of learning targets in multiple subjects. It’s fine—even recommended—to approach integration gradually. As long as the connections between subjects are purposeful and the instructional activities mutually support learning in each of targeted subjects, you’re on the right track.

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