“Regardless if you succeed or not, interdisciplinary teaching is not a wasted effort.” Benefits, challenges, and facilitating factors for interdisciplinary teaching

Abstract

This study looks at the benefits of interdisciplinary teaching for students and teachers, and investigates what teachers believe needs to be facilitated in order to promote interdisciplinary teaching in lower secondary school. This study is a cross-subject collaboration between English didactics and Social Studies didactics. Our findings are based on empirical data gathered through interviews of teachers and on previous research on the benefits of interdisciplinary teaching. These show that both teachers and students experience a heightened sense of motivation when interdisciplinary teaching is implemented into teaching practice. Students also develop the ability to see and understand connections between school subjects, which is an important condition in in-depth learning. The results describe two different approaches for working with interdisciplinary teaching. To further develop interdisciplinary practice in schools, school leadership has to facilitate teacher cooperation and create guidelines for planning and reflection. This study may contribute to a wider understanding of how interdisciplinary teaching can be used, and we hope it can inspire other teachers and school faculty to start the development of an interdisciplinary practice.