EDFS - Foundations and Secondary

As part of the teacher education program, the student demonstrates in public school classrooms the abilities to draw on deep content knowledge in order to plan, implement, and evaluate curriculum; to foster and to assess student learning; to identify and plan for the needs of diverse learners; to contribute to the life of the school and community.

Prerequisite: Admission to the MAT Program. A field-based study of the intellectual, physical, emotional, psychological, and social developmental characteristics of the secondary student.

Prerequisite: Admission to the MAT Program. Students will acquire the skills for selecting implementing, and assessing secondary curricula. Emphasis will be on active learning methods that address a variety of learning styles and on applying skills in the field.

Prerequisite: Admission to the MAT Program. A field-based study of the cultural dimensions of schooling and how they affect teaching and learning and a study of theories and practices that foster meaningful learning experiences for culturally diverse student populations. Students will apply their knowledge of culture and schooling to classroom practices.

Prerequisite: Admission to the MAT Program. A field-based study of the process, interpretation, and practical application of reflective thinking and systematic inquiry to inform classroom practice, foster effective teaching, and enable meaningful learning experiences. Student will also conduct a classroom inquiry project.

A comprehensive study of learning and teaching theories with emphasis upon recent literature and of methods and techniques utilized to facilitate the understanding of human performance.

A study of secondary curriculum from an historical perspective followed by discussions of curriculum from viewpoints of the different stakeholders, and of current curricular issues.

Prerequisite: Admission to M.Ed. This course will be required by all of the M.Ed. programs in the College of Education. It will focus on the interdependence of factors that affect student learning, both inside and outside the classroom, and will address the following questions: What is school improvement? What are its history, philosophy, and political ramification? What are school improvement plans, and how can they be improved? What are the roles of faculty in school improvement? What are the common factors in schools that have effected significant change?

Prerequisite: EDFS 6224. This course is designed to prepare teachers to identify their schools’ demographics; analyze their schools’ improvement process and its impact on subsets of the student population; identify current school problems relating to diversity; and select one area of interest for which to create an individual research plan.

Prerequisite: EDFS 6225. A survey of inquiry models and paradigms relevant to the study of school improvement efforts. Includes analyses of assumptions fundamental to differing perspectives with an emphasis upon change theory and dynamics.

Prerequisite: EDFS 6226. A study of the fundamentals of educational research with an emphasis on development of a research proposal to study the effectiveness of a school improvement initiative.

This course will serve as a culmination of the school improvement research project within the teacher’s major field of study with an emphasis on various quantitative and qualitative ways of analyzing and disseminating data collected as a part of a school improvement project.

Graduate-level field experience in selected classrooms or in exemplary educational programs. Requires approval by the M.A.T. Coordinator. Additional special course fee required; see semester course schedule for amount.

Prerequisites: Completion of M.Ed. Core. Designed to promote accomplished teaching through systematic inquiry into practice, reflection on practice, and collaboration with others in meeting learners’ needs.

This course will examine the structure of each social studies content discipline and the application of instructional approaches to integrate these structures into effective teaching and learning in the secondary classroom. Understanding of how to plan, instruct, and assess using state and national social studies standards and the acquisition of content related teaching resources serves as the foundation of the course. Students will demonstrate the effective use of the integration of content into a selected instructional approach as the summative performance task in the course.

The purpose of this course is to provide pre-service and in-service teachers with content-specific knowledge, methods, and theoretical basis necessary for success in the secondary mathematics classroom. The course content emphasizes: teaching for conceptual understanding, problem solving, reasoning and sense making, proof, modeling, representations, mathematics as a coherent and connected subject, and technology integration. The course is also designed to help pre-service and in service teachers develop an understanding of how to use national and state mathematics standards in lesson planning, instruction, and assessment, and become aware of various teaching resources that are available to enrich math instruction.

This course explores approaches to text, reading process, literary theory, the teaching of literature, and ways to support struggling readers.

This course explores 21st century literacies, the composition process, and how one might develop proficient consumers and producers of text in a variety of formats.

Admission to the MAT, MED, EdS degree. The purpose of this course is to provide pre-service and in-service teachers with content-specific knowledge, methods, and theoretical basis necessary for success in the secondary science classroom. The course content emphasizes : teaching for conceptual understanding, problem solving, reasoning and sense making, proof, modeling, representations, science as a coherent and connected subject, and technology integration. The course is also designed to help pre-service and in-service teachers develop and understanding of how to use national and state science standards in lesson planning, instruction and assessment, and become aware of various teaching resources that are available to enrich science instruction.

A survey of educational philosophies in their historical context to develop understanding of practices and policies in education.

Prerequisite: Admission to ED.S. Program and partial completion of course work. Seeks to develop research skills and related competencies in planning and conducting applied research studies. Focuses on research designs relevant to advanced education research.

Prerequisite: EDFS 7134. The supervised implementation of an individual research project, including securing and handling data, data analysis, describing results, drawing conclusions, and reporting in a scholarly manner for submission to a professional journal.

Prerequisite: admission to Ed.S. program. An opportunity to critically analyze issues, theories, practices, and problems of the profession. Includes topic identification and literature search for individual research project.