Identifying the roles of technology: a systematic review of STEM education in primary and secondary schools from 2015 to 2023

ABSTRACT

Background

With the rapid advancement of technology, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education has undergone significant transformations through the integration of various technologies. Studies are needed to provide a birds-eye view of the technology-oriented STEM education for identifying current status, development trends, and future directions.

Purpose

This review aims to explore the characteristics of technology-oriented STEM education in primary and secondary schools, focusing on its status, regional contributions, subject domains, integration levels, outcomes, types of technologies, and research methods.

Methods

To conduct this review study, the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses method was utilized, leading to the identification of 127 empirical studies from databases and selected journals.

Results and conclusion

The results, based on a combination of research methods, revealed a notable increase in empirical studies on technology-oriented STEM education. Among the STEM subjects, more than half of the studies emphasized the integration of a single STEM subject, with interdisciplinary integration being dominant. Engineering was observed to be the least integrated subject among the four STEM areas. Learning objectives in the studies emphasized 21st-century skills and STEM skills, while affective research mainly focused on interests, attitudes, and engagement. Student-centered learning, such as inquiry-based learning and game-based learning, along with engineering design, emerged as the most commonly adopted pedagogical approaches. In the realm of technology tools, computational tools were found to be widely embraced in technology-oriented STEM education. Notably, the majority of studies targeted students in upper primary and junior secondary schools, employing mixed research methods. These findings hold significant implications for the design and implementation of technology-oriented STEM education at primary and secondary school levels.

KEYWORDS:

• Empirical studies
• primary and secondary levels
• PRISMA
• STEM education
• technologies

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Author’s contribution

The first author was responsible for writing the paper and organizing the research work. The second author contributes to doing data analysis and interpreting part of the data. The third author contributes to part of the literature review and data collection. The corresponding author proposed the framework and participated in the writing process. The fifth author provided suggestions and comments on improving the paper.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/02635143.2023.2251902

Availability of data and materials

The data of this study are available upon reasonable request from the corresponding author.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the grant from University-Level Educational Reformation Research Project (CCNUAI&FE2022-03-15) of Central China Normal University, China.