Education (ED)

Through a human rights-based approach, this course provides a powerful and coherent toolkit of frameworks, skills, and model activities to support educators in every field to be reflective teachers, trainers, and leaders in the community and the business world who can empower people to understand and respond to problems in schools, businesses, communities and the world with effective strategies for change.

This course provides students with a knowledge base of the historical, cultural, social, economic, and political contexts in which North American schools have developed. Among the number of important threads to be examined throughout the course, emphasis will be placed on the social movements that have made improvements in equitable educational access, opportunity, achievement, and teaching towards democratic ends.. Students are encouraged to develop analytic frameworks and critical perspectives on education so that they may gain balanced understandings of current educational policies and practices in order to be able to make informed decisions about them as both educators and citizens. All students enrolled in the course are required to complete fifteen hours of fieldwork in a K-12 classroom setting. The course is open to all majors. This course is a prerequisite to the professional course sequence in Teacher Education. A grade of B or higher is required for admission into the teacher education program. Field Experience: 15 hours.

Surveys research related to theories of cognitive development, student diversity, information processing, motivation, and classroom management in order to provide an introduction to effective instruction in the 21st century classroom. A grade of B or higher is required for application to the Teacher Education Program. This course includes 15 hours of field experience. 3 credits.

Study of the basic principles, key measurement concepts, and practices of formal and informal assessment techniques to support educational needs in the classroom.

Designed to instruct teacher candidates in the application of technology in support of instruction and learning across the P-12 curriculum. The objectives of the course are based, in large part, on the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Standards for learning, teaching, and leading in the digital age.

This course is designed to introduce students to the concept of multicultural education as an ongoing process of school reform for the purpose of creating an equitable learning environment for all students. Multicultural education is viewed as ingrained in all aspects of the school environment: curriculum, instructional strategies, interactions among students, teachers, and families, as well as a school's overall vision of teaching and learning. Topics will include the impact of educational laws and learning standards, structural and organizational issues in schools, critical pedagogy, antiracist teaching, multilingualism, the school-to-prison pipeline, and restorative justice.

This course is designed to provide students with both a historical overview of education within densely populated, large metropolitan areas, as well as the opportunity to analyze contemporary educational inequalities. As it locates urban education at the intersection of both geographical and socioeconomic characteristics, this course will explore topics such as poverty, school segregation, under-resourced schools, and the ways in which these issues and conditions affect children within the educational system. This course will focus on the ways in which African American and Latino students are disproportionately affected by inequality in funding as rates of school segregation increase along with a lack of qualified teachers or updated materials and facilities, making connections to the school-to-prison pipeline. As the course emphasizes the impact that federal budgetary decisions have on city schools, it also focuses on how children can be taught more effectively in various contexts, with all of the existing issues.

In this course students are introduced to the political dimensions of schooling and the contested educational reform debates in the local and national context. Emphasis is placed on engaging students through dialogic teaching and learning so that they can acquire the analytic tools for understanding how politics shape educational policies, as well as the participatory role educators can play in the policy arena.

In this course students develop an awareness of the ideological and structural inequities in various educational settings and concrete and sustaining ways to promote educational equity and social justice to maximize the potential for all students to achieve educational outcomes.

In this course students are introduced to a collaborative, socially conscious form of inquiry known as action research designed to identify a contemporary phenomenon and/or diagnose a problem in a classroom, school, school community, or educational organization and design a practical plan of action that leads to improvement or impacts positive change for those affected.

Designed to prepare teacher candidates with the necessary competencies for meeting the instructional needs of linguistically diverse learners in the inclusive classroom. Topics to be explored include stages of language acquisition, language development, styles of communication, as well as strategies and instructional practices to help English Language Learners develop proficiency in all domains of language development-listening, speaking, reading, and writing - so that they may achieve academic success.

Travel study of the history, art, and culture in Florence through a department-sponsored tour. The course demonstrates the im-portance of art instruction for literacy development in both childhood and secondary education. Preparation classes and papers are required.

Two full-time placements in an elementary school, middle school, or high school (as appropriate to the student's teaching level) of the student's senior year. Includes a bi-weekly seminar at the College. Restrictions apply regarding the number of other courses that may be taken during this semester. A portfolio must be completed during the student teacher semester. Course fee.

Independent work in an area of special interest. Special project, report, or term paper.

This capstone course for all Educational Studies majors provides a platform for educational inquiry across areas of specialized interest and for a range of education stakeholders including activists, administrators, paraprofessionals, policymakers, or informed citizens. While designed to develop the individual interests of seminar participants, particular emphasis is on expanding the habits of mind developed in prerequisite courses and exploring issues of historical and current educational topics. To that end, seminar participants will undertake an inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon and/or diagnose a problem in an organization, community, school, or program and discuss interventions and practical plans of action that impact positive change for those affected. Collaborative learning and critical peer review are essential aspects of the seminar. A capstone project is required.