STEM education in primary schools of Southeast Asian countries: An analysis of scientific publications in the Scopus database from 2000 to 2022

Abstract

STEM education, which stands for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, is an important educational model in primary and secondary schools, including elementary schools. STEM education is being emphasized in many countries around the world. In Southeast Asia, the current state of STEM education is quite diverse and there is a discrepancy between countries. This study focuses on analyzing quantitative scientific indicators based on 490 publications on STEM education in elementary schools from 2000 to December 2022 in the Scopus database. The data is analyzed by bibliometrics software Biblioshiny and VOSviewer on the collaboration network between scientists in the field of STEM education in elementary schools, countries with the most publications, emerging keywords and related keywords, as well as research trends on STEM education in elementary schools for Southeast Asian countries. The results of the study show that publications on STEM education in elementary schools in Southeast Asian countries started to be studied from 2008 and have been increasing rapidly; scientific papers published in some high-impact factor journals; the countries with the most publications are not necessarily Southeast Asian countries, mainly in the Americas, Europe, Asia, with Indonesia being the only Southeast Asian country in the top-5 countries with the most publications on this research trend. Based on the analysis, the article proposes some directions for STEM education research in elementary schools in Southeast Asian countries to achieve high effectiveness in training at elementary schools.