STEAM, Thematic Seamless Curriculum Ideas and Interdisciplinary Education Studies
Web Resources for Integrated Thematic Teaching
What is Information Literacy versus Fake News
Integrate Science, Music, Technolgy by teaching students to become Ham Radio Operators with a Free Tutorial. They can learn to guard our airwaves and even save lives in an emergency. Find Crystal Radio kits online and much much more on this page.
Web Resources for Integrated Thematic Teaching
Integrated curriculum, interdisciplinary teaching, thematic teaching, synergistic teaching.... When attempting to define integrated curriculum, it is also necessary to look at related terms. Several definitions are offered here. As this paper is narrowed to K-12 integrated curriculum, definitions from vocational and higher education are not included, although there is a growing interest in both of those areas in the interdisciplinary, integrated curriculum. The reader interested in specifics about interdisciplinary work in those fields is invited to consult the General References at the end of this report.
What is a Cross - Curricular Thematic
Reading Instruction
Using reading as a focus, this site shows how reading can be developed in more effective ways by taking a
thematic approach. It gives you background, definitions, examples from reading programs, planning hints
and
examples of feedback from students on the thematic approach.
MaryEllen Vogt explains what cross-curricular thematic units are, how they are developed, advantages and
useful ideas for asseessment and getting started.
STEAM | Interdisciplinary Curriculum education
I wanted to share with you about a STEAM day school festival that I participated
in
2016 and this past Spring with my recycled music group, Trashtronauts (www.soundslikegarbage.org).
Starting the day-long festival, my group went to three classes of 1st graders to present about recycled
instruments and instrument building, using powerpoints, videos and readymade instruments to engage the
kids
with principals of recycling, where garbage goes, and creative reuse of garbage with the video about
Landfill Harmonic Orchestra from Paraguay.
We used only recycled, household materials in our presentations, and we instructed all 90 1st graders on
how
to make their own drum or shaker. For the afternoon outdoor STEAM festival (classes ended early), we were
one of the 20 presenters setup to engage the kids as they freely traveled between booths. Most of the kids
we saw during the morning were running around shaking and banging their instruments, and many of them came
to play along with us as we presented song cycles that we compose for our trash ensemble. Here is a URL of
the a Article written about the event:
Derek Jones
Florida Folklife Program Assistant - Tallahassee, FL derek.jones@dos.myflorida.com
Marion Brady's A Seamless Curriculum
A curriculum
that respects the integrated nature of knowledge will permit a quantum leap in student performance. If,
however, you think having different fields of study interlock and reinforce each other is a good idea,
and
are interested in several hundred activities that do that, plus push kids to use every known thought
process, plus engage at least some lousy students and challenge your best, plus move steadily from
simple
to ever-more-complex ideas, plus give you lots of latitude for exercising your creativity.
Supradiscipline Start off in the right direction. Just about everything that's
wrong with the traditional curriculum stems directly or indirectly from the awkward, artificial, arbitrary
way the disciplines take reality apart to facilitate specialized study. Offer an alternative way to
segment
reality—the "supradiscipline" implicit in our ordinary, non-school approach. This
supradiscipline
has five components. Dealing with reality, we note (a) time frame, (b) setting, (c) participant actors,
(d)
physical action, and (e) the states of mind that "explain" the action. When? Where? Who? What?
Why?
These five "mega-concepts," with their supporting conceptual substructures, encompass, organize,
and integrate all present knowledge. All future knowledge will be a product of the exploration of
relationships between them. The instructional challenge is to make our implicit supradiscipline explicit,
elaborate it until it encompasses and organizes everything known, and make it our major tool for
understanding reality and coping with life.
Geometry through Art Grade: Kindergarten - 9
Synopsis: Is geometry beautiful? Students are encouraged to explore their artistic side as they work with
geometric shapes and figures. Hands-on activities, worksheets, and vocabulary definitions are provided.