ISLS 2026 Agenda

Thursday, June 18 · 22 sessions

8:00 AM

6 options scroll

Short Paper · ALP 1110

Co-design, creative methods art-based approaches

Six papers explore co-design and creative methods, from tangible classroom models and arts-based climate storytelling to liberatory computational making with Black boys and trust-building in design-based research teams. Threads include reconceptualizing imagination as social practice and using network analysis to improve co-designed online graduate courses.

STEM Education in a talk

6 talks

Short Paper · ALP 1120

Teacher professional development in practice

Papers report on teacher professional development in practice, examining tolerance for ambiguity in model-based science, dialogic teaching change through video-based PD, and teachers' evolving views of scientific uncertainty as a resource. Other talks cover computational thinking PD, video-based math identity research, and pre-service teachers' TPACK trajectories.

STEM Education in a talk

6 talks

Symposium · ALP 2300

Investigating, Understanding, and Generating Concreteness in STEM Education

A symposium examining the role of concreteness and abstraction in STEM learning, offering a critical perspective on concrete representations and a data-driven taxonomy for describing them. Contributions also present automatic generation of concrete representations and connect mathematics-education discourse to other STEM disciplines.

STEM Education

Short Paper · ALP 2500

Group Dynamics and Processes

A short-paper session on group dynamics in collaborative learning, examining how active participation, role enactment, and disciplinary engagement unfold over time. Methods include implicit-scripts analysis, physiological synchrony, AR-based inquiry, and socially shared regulation in STEM.

STEM Education in a talk

5 talks

Long Paper · ALP 2600

Ideology, Culture, and Race in Learning

A long-paper session on how ideology, culture, and race shape learning and teaching, with studies on facilitator sensemaking about social-emotional learning in a refugee program and a justice-centered genetics unit on racial health disparities. Other papers analyze whiteness in science professional development and the epistemic work of a right-wing education podcast.

STEM Education in a talk

4 talks

Short Paper · ALP 2700

VR/AR/MR/XR and immersive learning

A short-paper session on immersive learning across VR, AR, and mixed reality, addressing how to assess learning processes with multimodal and log data rather than pre-post tests alone. Studies span AR multispecies inquiry with bees, instructional sequencing in VR, career exploration, and mobile AR for adult language learning.

STEM Education in a talk

5 talks

10:00 AM

6 options scroll

Short Paper · ALP 1100

Scaffolding and design of scaffolds

Papers examine scaffolding and scaffold design, from teachers co-navigating student uncertainty in science to instructional scaffolding of interlocking models in phenomenon-driven units. Other talks cover curriculum-mediated teacher noticing in geometry simulations, personalized Parsons code puzzles, and AI designed to scaffold generative cognitive engagement.

STEM Education in a talk

5 talks

Short Paper · ALP 1110

Data Literacy and Data Science Education

Papers on data literacy and data science education range from students creating biometric data visualizations to confronting coloniality and Indigenous food sovereignty in data science. Threads include youth conceptions of data, a roleplay-based curriculum embedding epistemological pluralism, and epistemic practices in an online fitness community.

STEM Education in a talk

6 talks

Short Paper · ALP 1120

Argumentation, dialogue, and dialogic engagement

Papers examine argumentation and dialogic engagement, from supporting competent outsiders' source evaluation with the AIR framework to a dual preparation model for dialogic teaching in East Asian classrooms. Other talks offer a typology of social bids in math groupwork and interaction analysis of knowledge construction in multilingual Indian science classrooms.

STEM Education in a talk

4 talks

Long Paper · ALP 1700

Epistemic Cognition

Long papers on epistemic cognition examine how learners coordinate knowledge and evaluate sources, including physics students' math-concept integration and high schoolers' epistemic vigilance toward everyday science. Additional talks cover epistemic navigation in a unit on Traditional Chinese Medicine and how laypeople resolve expert disagreement.

STEM Education in a talk

4 talks

Short Paper · ALP 2200

Collaborative STEM Inquiry

Short papers on collaborative STEM inquiry span engineering notebooks scaffolding middle school robotics, multi-user immersive VR for science learning, and collaboration quality in computational modeling. Threads also include teacher knowledge building via KNILT minicourses and ordered-network-analysis-supported reflective assessment.

STEM Education in a talk

5 talks

Short Paper · ALP 2500

Perceptions of Innovation and Change

Papers examine perceptions of innovation and change, with several analyzing teacher and STEM-educator sentiments about generative AI through social media discourse on X and Reddit. Other talks cover participatory design for AI in teacher education, reconceptualizing conversational AI as a learning medium, and NGSS implementation.

STEM Education in a talk

5 talks

2:30 PM

8 options scroll

Short Paper · ALP 1110

AI tools, interactions, and design

Six short papers on designing AI tools and understanding human-AI interaction in learning. Topics include AI's effect on the writing process, hybrid-intelligence and human-in-the-loop systems, four years of AI formative assessment and fairness, conversation-based assessment with AI agents, and new interfaces for AI-supported writing.

STEM Education in a talk

6 talks

Short Paper · ALP 1120

Embodied Learning

Five short papers on how bodies, movement, and representations mediate learning across science and mathematics. Topics include walking curricula reconnecting students with nature, transnational youth and climate justice, multimodal methods for analyzing embodied geometry, domain-inherent metaphors, and diagrams that bridge real and mathematical worlds.

STEM Education in a talk

5 talks

Long Paper · ALP 2500

Motivation, Interest, Identity, and Achievement

Four quantitative papers linking motivation, identity, belonging, and achievement, several at large scale. Topics span equity-oriented pedagogy predicting college success, the attenuation of math identity across the high-school-to-STEM transition, motivation mediating belonging and STEM persistence, and affective-cognitive links in primary students' scientific literacy.

STEM Education in a talk

4 talks

Long Paper · ALP 2600

Epistemic Authority and Agency

Four papers examining how authority and agency are distributed among students, teachers, and AI tools during learning. Threads include authority in elementary science modeling, how students remix AI chatbots into dialogic tools, epistemic agency in student-LLM math problem solving, and analytics-supported reflective assessment for pre-service teachers.

STEM Education in a talk

4 talks

Short Paper · ALP 2700

Integrating Computer Science with Science Education

Six short papers on integrating computer science and computational thinking with science, math, and special education. Threads include an umbrella review of CT-math integration, AI as a creative-computing design partner, computing for special-education contexts, quantum computational thinking, and teachers designing physical-computing and robotics units.

STEM Education in a talk

6 talks

Long Paper · ALP 3610

Computer Science Education

Four papers on how programming environments and AI are reshaping computer science education. Topics include balancing usability and expressiveness in block-based modeling, Parsons puzzles paired with self-explanation, teachers' shifting conceptions of AI/ML and algorithmic justice, and norms around when copying code is acceptable.

STEM Education in a talk

4 talks

Arts Gallery & Performance · ALP 3700

#1334: MOVE about it: getting groups thinking together through movement

A team of learning scientists and dancer-choreographers shares MOVE about it, a deck of movement-prompt cards from the Choreographing Science Project for sparking collective thinking through improvisational choreography. The work explores how dancing together can destabilize epistemic hierarchies and support embodied learning.

STEM Education

Short Paper · Barclay

Co-Design, Community-based education, sociocultural learning

Six short papers examine co-design and community-engaged education across undergraduate science, minority-owned small businesses, and intergenerational environmental-justice programs. Threads include enacting solidarity in community partnerships, collaborative data co-analysis, and culturally sustaining pedagogy through game redesign.

STEM Education in a talk

6 talks

4:15 PM

2 options scroll

Demo & Interactive · ALP 1700

Demo & Interactive Session

A hands-on demo session showcasing AI-powered learning tools, including GenAI writing platforms, AI tutors for STEM and self-explanation, and teachable agents. Other demos cover collaboration analytics dashboards, agent-based modeling, VR reflection agents, and mobile creative-coding for community contexts.

STEM Education in a talk

23 talks

Poster · Outdoors

ICLS Posters - Thursday Poster Session (In-Person)

An in-person poster session covering wide-ranging learning sciences research, including science and engineering teacher reasoning, AI in classrooms, and equity-oriented design in research-practice partnerships. Topics span heritage-language and algebra apps, urban gardens as educational technology, cognitive presence in MOOCs, and community-engaged research experiences.

STEM Education in a talk

91 talks