Research On The Construction Of The Measurement Model Of STEAM Competence For Primary School Students

With the advent of the Industry 4.0 era and the era of artificial intelligence,the demand for comprehensive,practical,and innovative talents in countries around the world was increasing.Traditional school education was facing new changes.Education focusing on cultivating students’ STEAM competence has become a new path of the key to school education reform.The development of STEAM competence plays an important role in the cultivation of comprehensive,practical,learning,innovative and entrepreneurial talents.In the era of Industry 4.0,the development of science and technology and the humanities and arts was showing a trend of going hand in hand.The research and application of science and technology pay more and more attention to promoting the development and progress of the entire human society,and STEAM competence integrates the development of science,technology,the humanities and arts to promote the comprehensive quality of the students’ development,which meet the needs of the future society and the development of the times for comprehensive,practical,and innovative talents.On the one hand,"China’s Educational Modernization2035" puts forward the major strategic goals of building a country with a strong education and a country with talents,and realizing education modernization,and requires the improvement of the training and innovation capabilities of first-class talents.The development of STEAM competence is of great significance for cultivating world-class talents and enhancing students’ innovative ability.On the other hand,the "Overall Plan for Deepening Educational measurement Reform in the New Era" puts forward requirements for reforming school measurement and improving comprehensive measurement.Thus,it is necessary and important to explore the measurement of STEAM competence.Currently,STEAM education is being implemented in the United States,Britain,Japan,Canada,South Korea,China,and other countries.There are also thousands of primary and secondary schools in China that are exploring STEAM education,but primary and secondary schools and teachers seldom pay attention to the development of students’ STEAM competence.In the field of first-line teaching,the scientific measurement concepts,techniques,and tools for primary school students’ STEAM competence were lacking,and almost a blank in the specialties,assessment,and measurement model for STEAM competence of elementary school students.Schools and teachers have very different interpretations and understandings of the STEAM competence of the primary school students,and there are very little theoretical and empirical researches on the STEAM competence of the primary school students.The primary school stage is the starting point for students to scientifically and correctly understand the world and transform the world,as well as to help students shape a healthy worldview and outlook on life,and values.Elementary education is the top priority of basic education.Laying a good foundation is very important and significant for the future development of primary school students.Therefore,to fill the research gap,the primary school students’ STEAM competence measurement model construction research referenced the basic construction methods and ideas of the humanities and social science measurement models that are used to research by using a mixed research method that combining qualitative research methods and quantitative research methods,combining theoretical research and empirical research.In the research,it specifically using literature method,comparative research method,survey research method(questionnaire method and interview method),analytic hierarchy process,case research method,and statistical analysis method(exploratory factor analysis,structural equation model,path analysis,variance analysis,etc.),as well as SPSS25.0 software,Mplus8.3 software and R3.3.3 statistical analysis software,involving more than 1,134 expert survey samples and more than 2,224 student survey samples,and the study choose the primary school students in fourth grades,fifth grades,and sixth grades as the research objects,following the laws and characteristics of students’ physical and mental development,and combining the content of pedagogy,psychology,philosophy,systems science,statistics,measurement,etc.,to explore the definition and conception,value and significance of students’ STEAM competence,and to determine the specific representation of students’ STEAM competence,construct the STEAM competence measurement index system for primary school students,develop the STEAM competence measurement scale for primary school students,build the STEAM competence measurement model for primary school students,and test the reliability and validity of the STEAM competence measurement scale and model for primary school students in practice,and then apply it in primary school.The STEAM competence assessment scale and model are used to grasp the current development status of STEAM competence of primary school students,analyze the situation of different schools,diagnose the existing problems,and finally put forward countermeasures and suggestions for improving the STEAM competence of primary school students.The main process and conclusions of the whole research include the following four parts:First,explore the definition,meaning,and representation of STEAM competence of elementary school students.Through the use of comparative research methods and literature research methods,the researchers conducted an in-depth comparison and analysis of the current domestic and foreign research related to the STEAM competence of primary school students,specifically related to 12 research topics,including the origin and development of STEAM education,STEAM competence and its cultivation,assessment of STEAM competence,the research on the construction of measurement model.At the same time,based on the theoretical basis of cognitive development theory,complex system science theory,brain science theory,and multiple intelligence theory,combined with the questionnaire method and interview method,it collects experts from the eastern,central,and western regions of the country in related fields,and first-line primary and secondary school leaders and the teacher’s opinions and opinions on the definition,meaning and representation of the STEAM competence of primary school students,and then explore the definition of STEAM competence of primary school students.STEAM competence of primary school students refers to integrating knowledge and skills,processes and methods,emotional attitudes and values in the fields of science,technology,engineering,humanities and arts,and mathematics,and focusing on practical cognition,interpersonal interaction,and comprehensive evaluation that point to the individual,society,and life-world that three dimensions unfold,the sum of the students’ experience and performance in seven aspects: psychological cognition,situational learning,practical inquiry,social interaction,rational decision-making,creative presentation,and impact assessment.Second,construct a STEAM competence measurement index system for primary school students.Based on the analysis of the definition of elementary school students’ STEAM competence,further clarify the basic principles and methods of the construction of elementary school students’ STEAM competence measurement index system,comprehensively use the top-down theory construction method and the bottom-up opinion collection method,combined with the previous literature review,comparative studies,theoretical foundations,and research work have initially established the STEAM competence measurement framework for primary school students.After that,the STEAM competence measurement index system for primary school students was extensively solicited for the interview opinions of 23 well-known experts,and finally got the three dimensions and seven indicators of the primary school STEAM competence measurement Index system.The three dimensions refer to the individual dimension of practical cognition,the social dimension of interpersonal interaction,and the life dimension of comprehensive evaluation.The seven major indicators are psychological cognition,contextual learning,practical inquiry,social interaction,rational decision-making,creative presentation,and impact measurement.Third,establish a STEAM competence measurement model and scale for elementary school students.First,the study uses the analytic hierarchy process(AHP)to survey 39 experts,invites experts to rate the weights of the primary and secondary indicators of the STEAM competence measurement index system for primary school students,and uses the mvstats package in the R3.3.3 software for weight calculation and consistency test to get the weight coefficients.Then,based on the definition and measurement index system of STEAM competence of primary school students,combined with the physical and mental development characteristics and cognitive laws of primary school students in fourth,fifth,and sixth grades,the STEAM competence measurement scale for primary school student was researched and developed,and the STEAM competence measurement scale for primary school students was revised to make it accord with the actual situation and embraces the practicality.Finally,the study conducted two surveys on 7 schools.The samples of the two surveys were respectively subjected to exploratory factor analysis to adjust and delete the items of the STEAM competence measurement scale for primary school students,to ensure that the STEAM competence measurement scale and the model have a stable structure and are suitable for factor analysis.Then,the samples of the two investigations were respectively subjected to confirmatory factor analysis to explain and analyze the fitting condition,reliability,and validity of each index of the STEAM competence measurement scale and model for primary school students and the results of path analysis.The data results of the two survey samples show that the fit of the indicators was good,the reliability and validity are good,and the path analysis between the variables has also been confirmed,which finally proves the STEAM competence assessment scale and model for primary school students hold good scientificity,reliability,and validity.Also,using confirmatory factor analysis to analyze the data,synthesize the consequence of the AHP method and the method of confirmatory factor analysis,research finally gets the mathematical represented formulation of the STEAM competence measurement model of primary school student: S=0.31*a+0.34*b+0.35*c;a=0.30*q1+0.34*q2+0.36*q3;b=0.47*q4+0.53*q5;c=0.46*q6+0.54*q7.Among them,S means primary school students’ STEAM competence,“a” stands for practical cognition,“b” stands for interpersonal interaction,“c” stands for comprehensive evaluation,and “q1”,“q2”,“q3”,“q4”,“q5”,“q6”,“q7” represent psychological cognition,situational learning,practical exploration,social communication,rational decision,creative presentation,and impact assessment respectively.Fourth,test and apply the STEAM competence measurement model of primary school students in practice.Based on the principle of combining the whole and the part,the STEAM competence measurement model of primary school students is applied and tested.First,analyze the overall status and development level of the STEAM competence measurement of primary school students from two different survey samples,as well as the reliability and correlation analysis of each variable of the STEAM competence measurement model of primary school students.For the fourth,fifth,and sixth grade students and the ranking in the class,the group difference analysis on several variables was carried out.Secondly,a case analysis and case diagnosis were carried out for the basic situation of the 7 schools investigated and the development status of the pupils’ STEAM competence.At the same time,the subjective and objective aspects of the problems reflected by the school,teachers,and students during the entire investigation process were comprehensively refined.Based on the problem diagnosis,the countermeasures and suggestions for improving the STEAM competence of primary school students in the future were put forward for future research and reference.Therefore,the innovations of the research: Firstly,in the current situation where domestic and foreign research pays more attention to and emphasizes STEM competence,and the understanding of STEAM competence is very inconsistent,integrate different disciplines and perspectives,and use a combination of quantitative and stereotyped mixed research method,to explore the definition of STEAM competence of primary school students.Secondly,in the current situation,there is almost a blank in the research of STEAM competence measurement scale tools and model construction for primary school students at home and abroad,this research was initiate to construct a STEAM competence measurement model for primary school students.Explore and develop the STEAM competence measurement index system,scale tools,and models for elementary school students.Through empirical investigations,the current situation and development level of STEAM competence of 7school students are analyzed,and the measurement index system and quantity of STEAM competence of elementary school students are successfully verified.The scientificity,reliability,validity,and practicality of the measurement indicator system,measurement tools and models provide a scientific and effective measurement tool for diagnosing the development level of STEAM competence of primary school students and provide countermeasures and suggestions for improving the STEAM competence of primary school students.However,this research also has some limitations.Firstly,this research on the construction of the STEAM competence measurement model for elementary school students is a tentative exploration.Due to the limitations of research samples,project funding,research level,etc.,the applicability and generalizability of the STEAM competence measurement model for elementary school students and the deep application of the model,and in other aspects still needs to be tested by large-scale data.Secondly,there are relatively very little researches focus on the student’s STEAM competence at home and abroad.As the researcher’s knowledge breadth,disciplinary vision,etc.are limited,the research methods used in this study are also limited.Due to the consideration of different school features in curriculum and teaching,the study did not use unified test questions to test primary school students,and there are certain limitations only to verify through the development of scale tools.In the future,related issues will be discussed and resolved in a more in-depth and comprehensive way.