Promoting a Learning Scenario for an Integrated Approach to STEM: Prospective Teachers’ Perspectives in Portugal

This chapter reports on a teacher education project aiming to prepare Portuguese prospective teachers (PTs) of mathematics and of physics for developing STEM integration activities in school. This study aims to understand PTs’ perspectives About STEM integration in a learning scenario, enacted with eighth grade students that involve physics and statistics content, through an inquiry approach and using technology. The qualitative analysis of the data, collected from the participants’ written individual reflections and focus group interviews, centers on three dimensions of the “Authentic Integration” model adopted for the learning scenario. Results show that PTs of both subject areas value STEM integration in students’ education and all of them recognize its core elements in the enacted learning scenario; however, some of them question the effective integration of the two areas. These results may provide a focus for further research on the value of using this model in the context of teacher education.