Merging mathematics, biology, and local culture: exploring a traditional food project in elementary education

Abstract

Integrating scientific disciplines through a transdisciplinary approach is a pivotal component of contemporary learning paradigms, fostering educational experiences that transcend monodisciplinary boundaries and embrace the integration of diverse fields. Addressing this imperative, we collaborated with educators in Indonesia to devise a learning framework that interweaves mathematics, biology, and cultural dimensions by utilizing the context of Tempeh production – a traditional fermented food in Indonesia. This article delineates the intricacies of our pedagogical design, encompassing eight key stages: briefing, contextualization, exploration, action 1 to action 4, and reflection. Furthermore, we present a comprehensive analysis of students’ reflective writing, employing thematic analysis across six stages, namely description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusion, and action plan. This initiative seeks to forge connections between scientific disciplines and to furnish students with theoretical knowledge and tangible and pragmatic experiences.

Keywords:

• Transdisciplinary
• mathematics
• biology
• local culture
• reflective writing
• tempeh

Acknowledgments

As part of our writing transparency, we acknowledge that in finalising our writing, we used artificial intelligence tools to improve grammar and enhance academic vocabulary. We used Chat GPT 3.5 with the following prompts: “Please check the grammar error in my writing” and “Please paraphrase my writing into a scientific paragraph.” Furthermore, we used Grammarly in the follow-up checking process to reduce sentence words and improve grammar. Finally, we reviewed the suggestions and revised them for clarity and originality of our ideas and tone of language.

Authors’ contributions

The first and second authors designed the research, conducted data analysis, and drafted and finalized the manuscript. In addition, the first author was responsible for the data collection process. The third and fourth authors assisted in supervising and designing the study.

Consent to participate

The data gathered was exclusively utilized for research objectives, and the participants were explicitly requested to consent.

Disclosure statement

The authors reported no potential conflict of interest.

Data availability

The collected data and its analysis are included in the text.

Additional information

Funding

This work is supported by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research (BMBWF) with reference number MPC-2022-06063.