Improving students’ global problem-solving skills through STEM and English language teaching integration

Abstract: Nowadays, students face many challenges when solving global problems because they lack life skills, especially problem-solving skills, creativity skills, critical thinking skills and English skills. The purpose of the study is to show that STEM and English language teaching integration is one of the great ways to inspire young learners learning English, but also encourage and empower them develop life skills through applying STEM lessons on environmental issues. This research described a way of integrating STEM into the language teaching process following project based learning (PBL), and it was designed with the implementation of qualitative and quantitative research methods. The participants are 80 non-English major students. As a result, the integration of STEM and English language teaching improved students’ language skills and gave students the chance of using knowledge of other disciplines in English courses and developed students’ 21st century skills significantly as well. It is thought that this research can be an inspiration for both English teachers and STEM teachers to apply various approaches in their teaching processes. In addition, the study can be accepted as an example of the contribution of STEM to the English language teaching process. Moreover, the research is also an example to prove that teaching STEM English is one of the great ways of promoting young learners to solve global issues. Keywords: Young learners, STEM and English language teaching integration, English skills, PBL