Engineers have long proposed that simply providing instructional learning in STEM subjects may not be enough to provide students with adequate skill-building preparation that is needed for a higher-education and/or a career in a STEM field. Thinking outside the box for project work and hands-on STEM activities in which students can participate has become a goal for STEM advocates.
A recent paper from LEGO Education suggests that education could use a fresh approach that is more aligned with our current societal needs. In their paper It’s Time to Rethink Learning, featured here on STEM Alliance, LEGO Education addresses how traditional learning methods are not meeting the needs of students because they are not meeting the needs of our ever-changing world. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic and socioeconomic imbalances have severely hindered ample opportunities for many children worldwide to engage in hands-on learning and group work with peers. This leaves many students unmotivated, unprepared, and lacking much needed confidence to jump all in.
LEGO Education goes on to propose how education can be revamped in five main ways:
- Motivate Learning That Never Stops-using purposeful play and engaging activities, we can remove the stigma that learning is hard, boring, or something to “get through,” and instead inspire students to continuously grow through lifelong curiosity and exploration.
- Build Confidence and Community-traditional classroom instruction limits opportunities for students to develop skills in communication and teamwork, but purposeful play can actually increase and enhance these opportunities as students learn to engage with others.
- Address Systemic Inequities-purposeful play provides a mechanism that all children are naturally gifted in-playing! Therefore, providing purposeful play opportunities as a means to learn can reduce or even remove many of the social and economic barriers that are often present in a traditional learning environment.
Make Classrooms More Dynamic–research suggests that students in project-based learning classrooms across the United States significantly outperformed students in typical classrooms. Therefore, hands-on learning should become just as prioritized, if not more, than traditional instructional learning.- Inspire Creativity and Discovery-rather than focusing on finding the right answer, students can be guided to focus on asking the right questions, which can naturally propel them to seek and evaluate their own solutions.
Read the full paper It’s Time to Rethink Learning here. Visit www.LEGOeducation.com to connect with educators around the world to discuss how they are implementing purposeful play in the classroom.
Want to learn more about how LEGO is rethinking education? Check out this TryEngineering.org article Free STEAM Learning Program From NASA and Lego Launches Students to the Moon.