Blog #2 Research question

It sounds like everyone is having a similar experience focusing their research question down. Tara's words about not trying to tackle the world in a single Plan B are very wise indeed. But it's hard for me to not want to tackle the world with the amount of effort I've put into it.

I started out wanting to use data collected from my entire year, as I have been consciously filing away tests and reflections, thinking that my plan B was gonna be about my whole year experience. At the time my research question was clear. How can STEMS2 curriculum in a natural resource class inspire the next generation of environmental stewards? It really hit me after reading the 6th extinction that natural resource teachers have such a huge responsibility of training the next generation of environmental stewards in a time when we've never been so disconnected in our existence as a race. It's a monumental task, but one that natural resource teachers have great power to change. And yet, the curriculum we're teaching in natural resources, especially in Hawaii, is so far behind in the times and the culture.
                                              "If you teach a man to fish you feed him for life, but if you teach a man                                                    to respect fish, you feed his community for generations to come."

I wanted to use my Plan B to show how place based learning and STEMS2 curriculum was a solid platform to teach natural resources off of......

But I've finally succumbed to the realization that I won't tackle this all in my plan B...this is the first step int hat direction. For now I wanna show that a STEMS2 UNIT in natural resources can promote sense of place/engagement. Then one day down the road I can push for all units to include STEMS2.

So I've widdled my question down to:

How does the implementation of a STEMS2 unit in a high school natural resources class affect student engagement and sense of place?

I searched this question on google scholars and actually got some really good results. There's a lot of research done on engagement of students when exposed to the outdoors. Or when students are exposed to hands-on learning, and also when students are exposed to cultural places and ideals. There's also a lot of literature on how bridging community and school can be beneficial and this goes right along with my unit. I'm having lots of guest speakers and hopefully families coming together.

Overall I like the direction I'm going. I'm thinking about adding Hawaii into my question as in, How does a STEMS2 unit in a Hawaii natural resources class affect engagement and sense of place. I say this because I think circumstances are different over here and I want to acknowledge that fact.