As quoted in the theory of learning by renowned educator David Kolb, “Learning is the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experiences.” The future of education lies in practical and experiential learning. Learning through various medium stands a better chance to be retained. If we talk about experiential learning, one must know that experiential means one learns and develops through his or her own personal experiences and involvements. That is why experiential learning is often termed as “hands-on” experiences.
STEM which is an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics is a method of education wherein the subjects are taught in a group instead of regular classroom instruction. It emphasizes bridging the learning gap by putting the children at the core of the experience, making them active learners from passive listeners. STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) is the best example to understand the textual concept. STEM labs will provide the hands-on experiences to the primary school segment. STEM lab does not indicate that the student should have the flair for a science background. In fact, a student having flair for Humanities faculty can still get a chance to operate in STEM labs to have a better understanding of the curricular topics and the daily life around.
National Education Policy (NEP) mentions that “Annual curriculum shall be reduced to core subjects; therefore there is more room for curiosity address and critical analysis with the teacher. The teaching process shall be interactive encouraging students to ask questions and taking the methodology of teaching towards the experiential learning process. STEM education plays a key role in implementing NEP guidelines. It states that there must be a mention of vocational skills along with the theoretical subject is the assessment reports of the students.
The purpose of assessing the student should be purely on competency which shows the child’s academic progress throughout the primary years graduating towards the multidisciplinary approach in the Secondary Stage. Therefore the assessments as per the policy are more of a formative assessment that promotes more learning and development through high-order thinking skills while showing the progress in students’ competency learning graph.
We have discussed the mandate of NEP for vocational skills now lets’ know the benefits of STEM education on students:
1. It fosters inventiveness and creative quotient: Inventiveness along with creative quotient leads to new ideas and innovations. How can we forget the era of digital Smart Class which is the inventiveness leading to innovation which was obviously built through the study of STEM education
2. Adaption of Flexibility: The STEM education activities, allows the student to have their own DIY kits to experiment and learn, which allows them to make errors and redo the experiments and reach the conclusive results. Builds confidence and resilience among the student community
3. Encourages Curiosity: STEM education is all about bringing the text-book concept to live through experimenting with models, it fosters curiosity of trying new things, taking risks while performing the experiments.
4. Encourages leadership and teamwork: Students with varying levels of competency can perform the STEM projects together and learn from each other. The group performances and teamwork helps them achieving competitive abilities.
5. Implementing the gain knowledge: We all know that jobs of today will not exist tomorrow, in STEM education students learn to be street smart, job smart, and live smart. The ability to apply knowledge when they enter the job world is done in the early stages of primary years of school.
6. Encourages problem-solving: Problem-solving is solved by critical thinking wherein many experiments have 2 to 3 solutions and one which is best as per the prioritized situation is expected to be concluded. This fosters critical analysis at a faster pace.
The STEM focussed students sought better academic progress as compared to non-STEM students. Our nation has acknowledged the need for STEM-based education along with the digitally smart school of today’s era. With NEP 2020 emphasizing the STEM factor it has become more crucial for all governments to invest in the novel initiative. State governments urge all CSR corporate and advisors to build mini Science centres to promote STEM education in schools. As a part of CSR initiatives the STEM lab models can also be built as per the requirement of the private or government school, for instance, a school in need of an ICT lab can have a robust model of smart tech-infrastructure along with an experiential training program to build future tech-preneurs, on the other hand, school willing to build the mathematic equipment can have a focused numeracy approach to bring up the academic progress in Mathematics. Hence STEM labs are boon for the skill-based curriculum.
Adapting Vocational skills through STEM Labs 