Cultivating Innovative Thinking Skills in STEM Education

STEM教育中培养创新思维能力

• 批准号: 2120936
• 负责人: Sadan Kulturel-Konak
• 金额: $ 28.62万
• 依托单位: Pennsylvania State Univ University Park
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-10-15 至 2024-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2120936&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Cultivating; Innovative; Thinking; Skills; STEM

This project aims to serve the national interest by enhancing innovative thinking skills in STEM education, which is important for sustaining the nation’s global leadership in science and engineering. Student innovation competitions and challenges (ICCs) play an important role in motivating, educating, and providing training grounds for the next generation of innovators. Given the growth of ICCs in higher education entrepreneurship and innovation ecosystems, this project will help advance the theoretical basis for explaining how these experiential opportunities build students’ competence and self-confidence in innovation and help them discover their limitations and capabilities. Specifically, the proposed work will validate a theoretical research model based on Transformative Learning Theory with the overarching goal of helping STEM students become more open to new ideas, different identities, social attitudes, and values while also enabling them with decision-making tools to evaluate alternative viewpoints. By advancing the STEM education community’s understanding of the roles and processes of ICCs in cultivating an innovation mindset, the project outcomes will lead to better integration of ICCs within existing STEM curricula, thereby helping more students to develop an innovative mindset. Finally, a systematic investigation of strategies to attract a diverse group of students to ICCs will facilitate broadening participation in entrepreneurial and innovation ecosystems.The project postulates that participating in ICCs is a transformative experience for students as they gain deeper self-awareness of their capabilities in innovation and become more open and critically minded. To answer research questions related to this main hypothesis, the project puts forward a research model that synthesizes the Transformative Learning Theory and Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network’s 3Cs (Curiosity, Connections, Creating Value) Framework. The project’s research activities are organized in five interconnected research thrusts: (i) capturing students’ experiences in ICCs through interviews; (ii) developing the Transformative Learning Scale for the Innovation Mindset (TLSIM) to assess transformations in students’ mindset toward innovation; (iii) validating TLSIM in various ICCs and other experiential learning settings including internships and capstone courses; (iv) investigating the relationships among attributes of ICCs, student backgrounds, transformative learning processes, and student outcomes; and (v) studying the factors that motivate diverse groups of students to participate in ICCs. The project outcomes will generate new knowledge about how different aspects of ICCs can facilitate transformations in students’ mindsets toward innovation, thereby laying the groundwork to improve ICCs’ potential for building student agency and self-efficacy. In addition, the project outcomes will help to increase diversity and inclusion in STEM fields in two ways. First, the research model’s underlying hypothesis, which posits that transformative experiences lead to mindset changes, can stimulate new research on the effectiveness of STEM-related activities in attracting more diverse students. Second, by emphasizing open‐mindedness as a key outcome of ICCs, the project outcomes will support enhancing diversity, equity, and inclusion in entrepreneurial ecosystems. Project results will be disseminated to the STEM education community through technical conferences, engineering education journals, and academic social networks. The NSF IUSE: EHR Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. Through the Engaged Student Learning track, the program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该项目旨在通过提高STEM教育中的创新思维能力来服务于国家利益，这对于维持国家在科学和工程领域的全球领导地位至关重要。学生创新竞赛和挑战赛（ICC）在激励，教育和为下一代创新者提供培训场所方面发挥着重要作用。鉴于ICC在高等教育创业和创新生态系统中的增长，该项目将有助于推进解释这些体验机会如何建立学生创新能力和自信心的理论基础，并帮助他们发现自己的局限性和能力。具体而言，拟议的工作将验证基于变革性学习理论的理论研究模型，其总体目标是帮助STEM学生对新思想，不同身份，社会态度和价值观更加开放，同时使他们能够使用决策工具来评估替代观点。通过促进STEM教育界对ICCs在培养创新思维方面的作用和过程的理解，项目成果将使ICCs更好地融入现有STEM课程，从而帮助更多学生培养创新思维。最后，系统地研究吸引不同学生群体加入ICCs的策略，将有助于扩大对创业和创新生态系统的参与。该项目假设，参与ICCs对学生来说是一次变革性的经历，因为他们对自己的创新能力有了更深刻的自我认识，变得更加开放和批判性。为了回答与这一主要假设相关的研究问题，该项目提出了一个综合了变革性学习理论和克恩创业工程网络的3Cs（Curriculum，Connections，Creating Value）框架的研究模型。该项目的研究活动分为五个相互关联的研究主题：（i）通过访谈收集学生在ICC的经验;（ii）开发创新思维转变学习量表（TLSIM），以评估学生对创新的思维转变;（iii）在各种ICC和其他体验式学习环境中验证TLSIM，包括实习和顶点课程;（iv）调查跨文化课程的特质、学生背景、转化学习过程及学生成果之间的关系;及（v）研究促使不同组别学生参与跨文化课程的因素。项目成果将产生新的知识，了解ICC的不同方面如何促进学生思维方式向创新的转变，从而为提高ICC建立学生代理和自我效能的潜力奠定基础。此外，项目成果将有助于以两种方式增加STEM领域的多样性和包容性。首先，研究模型的基本假设，即变革性的经验会导致思维方式的变化，可以激发对STEM相关活动在吸引更多不同学生方面的有效性的新研究。其次，通过强调开放思想是ICC的关键成果，项目成果将支持增强创业生态系统的多样性，公平性和包容性。项目成果将通过技术会议、工程教育期刊和学术社交网络传播给STEM教育界。NSF IUSE：EHR计划支持研究和开发项目，以提高所有学生STEM教育的有效性。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

Building Inclusive Student Innovation Competitions, Exhibitions, and Training Programs

建立包容性的学生创新竞赛、展览和培训项目

• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: The Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS
• 作者: Kulturel-Konak, S;Konak, A.;Webster, N.;Murphy, P.K.
• 通讯作者: Murphy, P.K.

Entrepreneurial Mindset & Innovative Thinking Skills

创业心态

• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: 2023 ASEE Zone 1 Conference
• 作者: Konak, Abdullah;Kulturel-Konak, Sadan;Liu, Haibin
• 通讯作者: Liu, Haibin

The Role of Mentors in Student Innovation Competitions and Programs

导师在学生创新竞赛和项目中的作用

• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: ASEE Middle Atlantic 2022 Fall Conference
• 作者: Prince, Alexa J.;Kulturel-Konak, Sadan;Konak, Abdullah;Schneider, David R.;Mehta, Khanjan
• 通讯作者: Mehta, Khanjan

Overview of Student Innovation Competitions and Their Roles in STEM Education

• DOI: 10.18260/1-2--38445
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: 2021 Fall ASEE Middle Atlantic Section Meeting Proceedings
• 作者: Sadan Kulturel-Konak

Board 420: Using a Situational Leadership Framework to Understand the Role of Mentors in Cultivating Innovative Thinking Skills in STEM Education

Board 420：使用情境领导框架来了解导师在培养 STEM 教育创新思维技能方面的作用

• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
• 作者: Kulturel-Konak, Sadan;Konak, Abdullah;Adams, Chithra;Prince, Alexa J.;Schneider, David R.;Mehta, Khanjan
• 通讯作者: Mehta, Khanjan