This dissertation was an exploratory investigation of four institutions STEM endorsement programs. The investigation was done in three separate qualitative studies that explored each institution's staff and faculty views on developing and implementing their STEM endorsement programs, the views of faculty who developed and taught a STEM methods…

Investigated the value of a team-taught, integrated, elementary-level methods course. Student teacher surveys indicated that it was a beneficial learning experience for all which enabled students to see connections across content areas and understand how to explore subjects through inquiry and a unifying theme. Many students reported feeling…

Science-Technology-Society (STS) can be defined in various ways. For this study, STS is defined as a curricular tool that teachers can use to focus on the interactions between science, technology, and society to make learning more relevant to students' everyday lives. A small qualitative study was conducted with students in a secondary science…

Describes how several elementary teacher educators are learning to practice what they teach by integrating methods courses. This involves taking action to coordinate what occurs in each course and integrate what they do and how they do it, with a focus on interdisciplinary instruction. The process of learning to integrate methods courses involves…

This study compared the performance of two groups of preservice teachers at Kentucky's Morehead State University. One group had taken four of their methods courses (reading, language arts, social studies, and mathematics) in an integrated fashion from four faculty members. This group was termed the block group. The other group (the nonblock group)…

Students in business education and English education methods (n=25), randomly assigned to 9 mixed teams, developed an integrated high school curriculum unit. Survey results showed that 92% would teach the unit and appreciated its interdisciplinary potential. The one team that would not use it had experience group conflict issues. (SK)

The Learning Community program at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh brings together four individual teacher education methods courses in an integrated block with clinical field experience. The program provides teacher educators the opportunity to integrate their instruction with other courses and contextualize the learning of students with…

Four full days of classroom instruction, devoted to the modeling of effective curriculum integration, were designed for preservice elementary school teachers. The unit was the result of a conviction on the part of teacher educators that children learn best when learning is not separated into forty-minute periods of math, social studies, language…

Describes the collaboration between the social studies and technology methods courses as they created a technology-based learning community at the University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh. Provides rational for creating a learning community, presents the different obstacles during the course, and finally discusses the needed refinements. (CMK)

Describes an integrated methods course in a small university, including evolution of the course, topics covered, descriptions of student assignments and activities, procedures used in student evaluation, and student opinions of the integrated course. An appendix contains the outline of topics and student activities. (15 references) (Author/MKR)

The flexible, multi-contextual use of language is essential to integrated learning and thinking. Likewise, learning and thinking in an integrated way is essential to multi-dimensional teaching. This study examines the ways pre-service secondary teachers define their subjects. Students enrolled in a secondary reading methods course were asked to…

This study was conducted to determine if an integrated content-methods, two-course sequence for preservice elementary teachers (PSTs) affects the mathematical beliefs of these students in three main areas: (1) beliefs about mathematics as a discipline; (2) beliefs about how mathematics is learned and should be taught; and (3) beliefs about…

This project was designed to develop a model for teaching general music methods for elementary/early childhood education majors using musics of diverse cultures as discrete and infused entities, integrated across the curriculum. The proposed model's primary goal was to develop student awareness of sources of culturally diverse music and related…

The goal of teacher education is to prepare prospective teachers to become reflective practitioners who are able to make pedagogical decisions in light of sound theory. This report describes a model for integrating science and mathematics methods with student teaching. Efforts to maintain a critical bond between theory and practice is one…

Western Illinois University's College of Education and Human Services is redesigning its undergraduate teacher education program. The program places volunteer freshmen in real classrooms for long-term observations and volunteer assistance, eventually leading up to a full range of teaching opportunities. Also, coursework is presented in an…