STEM Education for Lifelong Learning: Case Study to Raise the Creative Products Level from Banana Leaf to Drive the Community Economy

Abstract

Learning activity according to the STEM education approach is an integrated science which can lead to a driving force for local development through the stimulating process and promoting potential lifelong learning of the small community enterprise group (SME). This is a new paradigm of learning activity with lessons learned from exploring and analyzing to needs assessment of SME. This leads to a problem solution, which are integrated 4 basic categories i.e., science (S), technology (T), engineering (E) and mathematics (M) to solve problems from real situations. There is an action plan process which can be practiced. The researcher designed a learning activity in STEM education based problem/project solving to improve critical thinking and creativity skills for new products of handicraft small community enterprise via learning concept of five-stage engineering design was followed as (1) problem determination, (2) researching related theories and concepts, (3) planning and development, (4) testing and evaluation, and (5) outcome and output presentation. From the study, the handicraft community enterprise group gained knowledge and applied the knowledge to solve problems including creating value-added of raw materials from the local bio-resource base in order to raise the creative products level from the banana leaf to drive the community economy for sustainability.