Curriculum and Course Schedule

This course is designed to explore how the ways that we live culturally provide strengths for teaching, learning and design. The course draws from the interdisciplinary study of sociocultural, linguistic, and contextual influences of education, as well as perspectives from learning, teaching, research and policy. Candidates will examine how issues of power and privilege as they pertain to race, ethnicity, language, class, gender, sexuality and identity politics shape and are shaped within our education system. Candidates will be asked to consider their own schooling experiences, and deeply evaluate their beliefs, thoughts and assumptions about the influence of various legal, historical, socio-cultural and linguistic factors on their ideas about teaching, learning, and schooling. Special attention will be given to the major trends that influence contemporary landscapes of PK-12 education and the potential systemic benefits and harms associated with them. Candidates will produce an autoethnography that considers the impact of personal formal and informal learning experiences rooted in racial, cultural and linguistic identity on their life view, as well as how they move through the world as advocates for justice.     

This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience. 

The Foundations of Learning in a New Language course engages pre-service teacher candidates in exploring historical, political, sociocultural, philosophical and educational practices that impact linguistically and culturally diverse learners in American schools. Topics include historical and current federal and state laws regarding the learning of English as a new language, foundations of first and second language acquisition, child development, sociocultural theory, and comparative international language instruction. Research and evidence based instructional models are discussed, with a deepened appreciation for factors contributing to sustained student achievement, including, but not limited to the psychological, cognitive, sociological, and cultural factors that impact student learning.  An emphasis is placed on the standards for initial Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) Pre-K-12 Teacher Preparation Programs and the WIDA Language Development Standards.    

This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience.

Contact the department for further information.

In this course we explore multiple major theories of typical cognitive and affective development, and their concomitant approaches to understanding and managing neurodiversity in the inclusive classroom. The focus is on integrating across theoretical frameworks in order to maximize classroom support and minimize the need for individual differentiation for students struggling with physical, academic or emotional challenges, including learning disabilities, emotional disturbance, attention deficit disorder, and autism spectrum disorder. Theoretical concepts are introduced in both readings and lecture. Teamwork exercises designed to promote research and theory-based practice provide students with opportunities to analyze increasingly complex case studies, while developing skills in educational leadership, collegial collaboration and student advocacy. 

This course will offer a critical perspective on child and adolescent development as it is shaped and experienced in various social contexts with special application to the world of the school. Psychological, interpersonal, social, cognitive, moral, and physical development will be studied within the contexts of family, peer group, and school. Theoretical perspectives will be explored in relation to empirical research, field studies, first person accounts, and imaginative works. Special emphasis will be given to the individual's subjective experience and to the remembered accounts of our own childhood and adolescence.

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The Linguistics Informed Approaches to Literacy course supports students in analyzing the aims of linguistic science as well as how linguistic concepts apply to teaching in a variety of settings (including with multilingual students, monolingual students, and bilingual classrooms).  Students will think about the complexities of language and how they connect with identity, culture, power, and schooling.  Students explore topics like syntax, phonology, morphology, semantics, and cognates as they develop their own metalinguistic awareness in support of facilitating effective teaching and learning.  A focal area will be supporting the development of students’ literacies. Content-area reading topics include but are not limited to pre-reading, post-reading, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension.   

This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience. 

The Assessment of Linguistically Diverse Students is a course that engages pre-service candidates in learning about a variety of assessment approaches, (including but not limited to standardized, formative, diagnostic, performance-based, etc.)  with special attention to how assessment of English-Language Learners has been conceptualized within American historical and contemporary sociopolitical and sociocultural contexts. Issues of legality, bias, non-discriminatory policies, and ethical considerations that must accompany decisions about standards and practices used in the assessment of culturally and linguistically diverse students will also be explored. Candidates will be asked to examine policies facing educators of linguistically diverse learners over the last century, and articulate multiple perspectives associated with the issue drawing from course readings and outside research. 

This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience. 

This course introduces teaching and learning strategies that aid students in becoming effective educators in the high school setting. Emphasizing current research, each course is a comprehensive study of teaching methods in the following secondary disciplines: English, mathematics, sciences, social sciences, and world languages. Lesson and unit planning and assessment of student learning are elements of the seminar.

The Theory into Practice course is strategically designed to support teacher candidates in applying their theoretical understandings and knowledge as they engage in the practices of observing, planning, teaching, assessing learning, and reflecting in the context of their fall practicum school placement.  Asset-based pedagogies are central to the course and teacher candidates will be engaged in a variety of experiences that help them learn about their students and school communities (including understanding students’ linguistic repertoires). Teacher candidates will continue to develop their understandings of language acquisition, theories of learning, content knowledge development, and effective teaching, as they analyze and explore classroom instruction (through both professional noticing in classrooms and their own teaching).  A variety of methods for teaching all students, including multilingual students, (both through ESL and bilingual lenses) will be explored as well as domain-specific methods.  Teacher candidates will explore strategies for making content comprehensible for all learners (including language learners) while supporting students and their development in each of the modes of communication (interpersonal, presentational, and interpretive).  This course prepares teacher candidates for the transition to full-time student teacher the following quarter.      

This course requires 2 full school days of field experience per week for the duration of the practicum. This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience specific to these endorsements.

Contact the department for further information.