STEM Storytime: Integrating STEM and Literacy in Early Childhood

This paper addresses the call for greater integration of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) in the context of creating a foundational focus for STEM, beginning in early childhood. The work draws on a birth-to-five developmental framework that models and connects seamlessly with the U.S. Framework for K-12 Science Education). These 3D frameworks integrate STEM across a small set of big ideas in four disciplinary areas (including engineering and technology), acquired through active engagement in science, engineering, and mathematical practices, and connected through meaningful crosscutting concepts. In addition, this project addresses the challenges and obstacles that teachers face in effective implementation by leveraging teachers’ comfort and young students’ enjoyment of storybooks as an additional level of integration, as recommended by the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2022 consensus volume on science and engineering from preschool through elementary grades. Finally, given the increase in young children in the U.S. who are learning more than one language as well as in other countries, the current study examined the instructional practices of preschool teachers during shared book reading sessions using a Spanish-English bilingual STEM storybook in an intentionally Spanish-English preschool setting. Findings support an increase in teacher use of three-dimensional (3D) STEM talk to provide information upon re-reading the storybook, regardless of the language(s) used to read. Interviews with the teachers revealed approval for the translational-equivalent structure of the bilingual storybook, and an appreciation of the STEM-embedded content format for introducing the content to these young students. This study extends findings on teacher practices and language use with a bilingual STEM-focused storybook in a bilingual preschool setting to support bilingual learners.