S12 E4: The Power of STEAM: Arts Integration and Inclusive Science Education

In this episode of Practical Access, Dr. Jonte’ Taylor, associate professor at Penn State, discusses the integration of arts into STEM education, creating an inclusive STEAM framework. Dr. Taylor emphasizes the importance of incorporating arts (the "A" in STEAM) as a tool for multimodal representation, aligning with Universal Design for Learning (UDL) to make science more accessible and engaging for all students, especially those with diverse needs.

The conversation covers strategies for teachers to foster inclusive science classrooms. Dr. Taylor highlights the significance of rethinking engagement, making science relevant to everyday life, and using a flexible approach to instruction that adapts to individual student needs. He discusses supporting students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders (EBD) in science classes, encouraging teachers to embrace active, hands-on learning, while also being sensitive to classroom dynamics.

The episode concludes with advice for special education teachers collaborating with experienced science teachers, emphasizing the power of adaptability and co-ownership of all students’ success. Dr. Taylor’s insights remind educators that inclusive, inquiry-based science education is attainable through collaboration, intentionality, and courage.

We love to hear from our listeners! If you have any questions, feel free to reach out. We look forward to receiving your questions on our Twitter (@Accesspractical) or Instagram (@Practical_Access).

Jonte' Taylor's Bio: https://ed.psu.edu/directory/dr-jonte-taylor

Publications: 

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jonte-Taylor

https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=qOuDFX4AAAAJ&hl=en

Transcript

00:00

Music.

Lisa Dieker  00:06

Welcome to Practical Access. I'm Lisa Dieker,

Rebecca Hines  00:09

and I'm Rebecca Hines and Lisa, I may be more excited about today's guest than you are, because this is, this is a man of many interests, and you know, I'm a starburst thinker. Who do we have?

Lisa Dieker  00:22

So, well we're excited to have with us today, Jonte' Taylor, who is an associate professor at Penn State and Jonte welcome. And you also said we could call you JT, so we're so excited to have you with us today. Thanks.

Jonte' Taylor  00:34

Oh no, it's great. I'm super excited to be here and to have a conversation with another starburst.

Rebecca Hines  00:45

So, you know, I will start, I will start with the questions. So in our little pre, pre-recording, we were, we were talking about bringing back the E into the A into the STEM and getting, getting out to the STEAM of it. So Lisa and I this this season, have been talking about math and talking about science. Can you bring out that A for me, a little bit. What are we missing right now in the science and the in the math and the conceptualization of it all together?

Jonte' Taylor  01:19

Sure, like for me when I think about it, and I'm mostly science, you know, I am mathadjacent, but definitely science in is thinking about it from a broader perspective. So, we always talk about, you know, universal design for learning with UDL. But even beyond that, when you think about the arts and how you know that's what the A is, is the arts, we should be thinking about the arts as part of a multimodal representation, because it is a visual representation of something, and we can make it as kind of connected, disconnected, associated as we want, whether it's whatever type of art you decide, performing arts, writing arts, visual arts, music arts, all of these different things. And I think the real issue is, or the real kind of way to look at it is understanding the arts beyond kind of for for those who are art teachers and teaching artists, they know what I'm talking about, because there are standards for arts education. We should be incorporating those standards as well into our science standards too. And you know, the idea of multimodal representation isn't new or even controversial. It's just, I think we don't always think about the arts as multimodal representation.

Rebecca Hines  02:48

And the arts are abstract thinking. You know, they're different interpretations, which exactly is what science is about.

Jonte' Taylor  02:54

Absolutely, and we don't leverage it enough. And one of the things that I am lucky, if you're not familiar, is happening the CEC is doing their professional developmentfair. And one of the divisions, the divisions of the arts, is going to have a conversation about art utilization and within kind of a STEM STEAM framework. So, that should be really cool.

Lisa Dieker  03:28

That's very exciting. And the thought of adding that visual representation and that UDL is really important. And I really enjoyed that whole concept of STEAM. And as you said, as a science expert. I'm curious about your thinking about because I know you did work with a postdoc in this area. How do we just get all kids and thenI think Becky's got some specific areas to ask you about. But, how do we get all kids in more inquiry based, inclusive settings in science for success? I that's what your work is really focused on. Is not just them being present, but then being present and being successful in science. What are some of your tips you'd give me as if I were a new science teacher for the first time, and I've got a caseload of students that I'm like, I'm not sure where to start? What would you suggest?

Jonte' Taylor  04:16

I think one of the things we have to start with is engagement. What do how do we define engagement? What is engagement look like? And it looks different for students, depending on where they are, we have to meet them where they are, and if we're meeting them where they are, then that means we have to adjust and have a broader, more flexible idea of what engagement can look like because we also have to, and I think this goes across the board, not just for science teachers, but also special educators, like, how are we thinking about science in general? So, what, what all the things that we do in life are science related, like, literally everything. What do we eat, what do we drink, what the clothes we wear, all these things. So, if we think about science in that kind of way, you know, then we can have a student who's a little bit more severe end of the need spectrum and like, okay, well, we're doing a lesson on kind of creating your own menus and what to buy and shop. That's a science lesson too, because we they, they still have to eat healthy. And what does that mean, health wise, which is again related to science. So what we intake, how it comes out. We, can, we can use the regular terms for that, but all of that is science. So, you know, I like to think about science across the entire spectrum of kind of students that we serve and needs. Sometimes we tend tofocus on, like, quote-unquote, high incidence disabilities, or just certain students can be in science classrooms. And I think that's that's a bit of a misnomer. We can do a lot more in the science space if we give students a chance, even students who are more moderate being in engineering classes or learning the principles of engineering. Will they build skyscrapers? Probably not, but that's okay. They don't have to. They can still kind of learn some of the principles of engineering, whether it's how pulley systems work or leverage, all of those things kind of matter. And you know, we have to be braver as teachers to want to do it. Yeah, I think all teachers want to do it. Let me be it's just, I don't know if we prepare them in the right way to do it.

Rebecca Hines  06:49

All I hear is that, Lisa, we got to create more brave teachers and and speaking of brave teachers, I know that we share an interest in, you know, supporting those kids who take a little more, take a little more from teachers. And, you know, kids with EBD specifically, you know, they are sometimes the ones who need the the interaction and the really high interest activities that a science class can offer. But they're also, you know, research wise, they're the ones that teachers are most reluctant.

Jonte' Taylor  07:26

Absolutely. 

Rebecca Hines  07:26

To include so, so what would you say to teachers who are like, You know what, I really want to have a highly active classroom, and I want to be able to do these things, but I've got four kids with with EBD in there, so we can't do it. What would you tell them?

Jonte' Taylor  07:39

Oh, I would, I would tell them one first things first, if you have access to it, there's research that tells us about this, right, particularly for kids with EBD. So, Lisa mentioned the work that I did as a postdoc, one of the things that I was able to do as a postdoc with Bill Therrien and so some other people I was working with, Brian Hand was we put together, like a meta analysis of kind of effective instruction for EBD and science, right? And the saddest part about that, I mean, it's great, the paper's fine, is out there. But, the saddest part about that is we went back to the 80s to like 2010 or 11, or whatever it was, and we were able to find, I think maybe 11 articles on EBD students in learning science, actual science.

Rebecca Hines  08:31

Right?

Jonte' Taylor  08:31

And I was like, that's a lot of time and not a lot of articles. So that is, that's one. We're clearly not doing it as you mentioned. Two, I think we have to be braver and understand our students. I can I can tell stories from working to EBD and doing science. You can tell stories Rebecca for doing EBD science, one of my favorite dudes in the world. Uh, my goodness. Ben Riden, who was a former doc student of mine, but he's doing great work at JMU. He was a EBD teacher, and he can talk, tell you stories about doing science in his classroom, and all of us can share the same thing our students were probably left out of general science classrooms, and then we had to do the science in our in our spaces, whatever spaces we had. And one of the things I think that that happens in in general, teachers in general are more nervous about working with kids with EBD because of reputation and so forth and so on, is like, if you know your kids, right? Then you can probably make this work, because you know what the things that trigger them and when they're having good days and bad days. Yes, there are beakers in science, depending on the type of science that you're doing. And yes, there's always in current concern when working with glass, with any kids. That doesn't mean it should be any more or less with kids with EBD is just knowing it's like, okay. Jack is having a bad dang day. Maybe no beakers today, but beakers tomorrow, and that's okay. That's more than okay. Is part of it is training. Part of it is comfortability, being comfortable doing it, and part of it is knowing your students. You know, a combination of all these, these two things should get you in a good place to start doing science, experimentation in your classroom, science are in a lot of people refer to the word argumentation, because, you know, part of science is argumentation. Debate is like, well, the kids with EBD, they don't debate and then fight over science. I'm not even mad if they fight over science. Like, like, at least it's over science. But, there are ways to have that also under control and make that happen in a manner that's going to be productive for all kids, all of them. So, you know, there, there are different things that we can do on the teacher prep side, there are things that we can do on a professional development side, and there are things that we can do on the instructional side, as far as how we were instructing kids to get everyone involved. Because inclusive science, the key word is inclusive. So if we're being not inclusive, that's exclusive. So, you know, words matter.

Lisa Dieker  11:35

I really enjoy, enjoyed your passion and your comments JT, I think it's spot on. So, our last question for you really would be when that I'm a new teacher, I'm assigned as a special ed teacher to co-teach with the 20 year best science teacher of the year, and I'm scared. What would be your advice to go in and start with as the person who's supposed to be the expert in kids with differences, meeting the person who really, really knows the science content? Where would I start?

Jonte' Taylor  12:12

I think this is a really good place for the thinking about the UDL approach, where, if we're going to do any kind of thing that for students with disabilities, it is probably going to benefit all students, right? So, it's not going to be this quote-on-quote extra thing that we're doing is going to be something that's all students are going to be able to use, benefit, and take advantage of that we can do regardless of what it is, you know, whether it's some making something multimodal, it's a visual support, it's an auditory, whatever kind of support it is. So, I think going in there, beyond the fact that you're just an expert of, say, students with disabilities, you're an expert of accommodation, and you're an expert of ADAPT, adaption and adapting things, because I think that's a better position to have. Hopefully you're ina true kind of collaborative space. And it's not just, Well, those kids are your kids kind of deal, because that's that's always problematic, is these are our kids, and if everyone doesn't feel like there are kids, then that's a problem. And try to also be in one, one of the things that I do run into sometimes is the idea of these kind of inquiry based classrooms. And you know where inquiry is just kind of conversational, as opposed to some other things, where we know students with disabilities can get left behind or lost. You have to be flexible there, but you also have to let your students be in a place of not knowing, and sometimes special-ed teachers are not comfortable with having their kids not know something is. It's a balance, and I know people tend to look at inquiry and behavioral as these two separate things, but I look at them as a spectrum, a spectrum, and you go across that spectrum, you know, sometimes you're going to be more inquiry, sometimes you're going to be more direct instruction. And that's, yeah, it, but it's, it should be flexible. That's the thing. We have to be flexible across that kind of constructivist versus, you know, behavioral space, and that's tends to be where the where the tension lies, and that's what I've been spending the past 10 to 15 years trying to figure out.

Rebecca Hines  14:49

Yeah, when you're when you're talking Jonte, you really the term flexible and behavior and all of these things really lead me to kind of a concluding thought, more. More than a question. I would love to see our science teachers be more intentional about when and how they find support for really specific days or lessons. We all know there's not, not everybody has a co-teacher. But is there anyone at your school? You could say, You know what? Wednesdays, I really want to be able to do more hands on, but I got some kids in there I'm worried about who, who in this whole school can come and just be an extra set of hands on Wednesdays from 10 to 10:30, so that kids don't have to be pulled out to do something different, and everybody gets a chance to do the same level of science and the same types of hands on opportunities.

Jonte' Taylor  15:38

You know, one of the, one of the first things I start with when I'm talking to particularly science teachers, is I asked them, how are you getting your information in, in in a classroom, active information? And it's like, you know, we're having these conversations, and we're, I was like, but what about the shy kids? Maybe they don't even have disabilities, but are you just shy and or are not confident in in the answers that they give, so they don't give answers. So then is, I introduce stuff like response cards, and that just just a simple change in how we're receiving information will start that process. So it's, you know, it is a lot of kind of that too.

Rebecca Hines  16:21

Right, absolutely.

Lisa Dieker  16:23

Thank you so much for joining us and some great advice and wisdom. And I think equity, access and opportunity and UDL, you got them all in there JT, so we really. And you really do have some wonderful thoughts in the field, so we appreciate your voice and your thoughts. And if you have any questions, please send us an email at, I mean, send us a Tweet at @AccessPractical or you can send us a post on our Facebook page. Practical Access. Thank you again for joining us. We appreciate it.

Jonte' Taylor  16:53

Awesome. This was awesome. This is great.

Rebecca Hines  16:56

Great talking with you.

Jonte' Taylor  16:57

Absolutely.