Support for collective argumentation in integrated STEM: A study of elementary teachers' practice

Argumentation is an important practice and an explicit goal in educational standards in multiple STEM disciplines. In this descriptive study of elementary teachers' practice, we draw on established frameworks to analyze teacher support for collective argumentation in integrated STEM. We watched over 100 h of video of classroom instruction from 10 elementary teachers and analyzed over 200 episodes of argumentation. We constructed an analytic methodology to categorize integrated STEM tasks, which draws on integrated STEM education literature and selected those teachers from our data who engaged their students in integrated STEM tasks, resulting in an in‐depth analysis of five teachers' practice. We found that the teachers supported students by contributing argument components, using a variety of questions and other supportive actions, and adapting their contributions and supports in different settings. Previous research on collective argumentation has been discipline specific; our study contributes an analysis of teacher support for collective argumentation in integrated STEM.