Syllabus

EDEC 6301: Theories in Early Childhood Education

Please note: The first synchronous online meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, January 27 at 7:00 PM Central time. This meeting will be held in Wimba, so please be sure that you have "set up" Wimba to run on your computer before the first scheduled meeting. You can find out how to do this in the Technology Orientation - found by clicking on Tech Orientation in the sidebar to your left.

Please make every effort to attend this first meeting as it will clear allow you to meet others in the class and ask for clarification on any issues about which you are uncertain.

After the initial meeting, our class will meet both synchronously and asynchronously (through wiki discussions and email). Tentative meeting time for synchronous meetings are:

Tuesdays at 7:00 PM (Central time)

We will not be meeting each week. Please check calendar for tentative specific meeting dates. More details about future meetings will be sent to you after the first Wimba meeting
 
Instructor Information

Dr. Georgianna Duarte, Ed. D.

Office Address:

80 Fort Brown
EDBC 1.128
Brownsville, TX 78520

 Contact:

Ph. 956-882-5710
Fax 956-882-8929

E-mail:georgianna.duarte@utb.edu
 
Course Description

Welcome to EDEC 6301 - Theories in Early Childhood Education.

This course will include major historical and current theoretical persepectives of early childhood education. These foundations will be used to examine special education, program models, family focused initiatives, and curiculum development. The application of theoretical principles will be examined through group and individual projects, classroom practice, research, and reflection papers

The first day of class is Tuesday, January 13, 2009. During the first two weeks you will spend time getting "set up" in preparation for fulfilling technology requirements that you will need to successfully complete this course. Please complete the Technology Orientation within the first two weeks. You can go directly to the Technology Orientation through a link on the menu bar to the left. Be sure you complete all activities.

This class will meet mostly asynchronously through a course wiki and emails. However, we will meet most weeks synchronously through Horizon Wimba Live Classroom. Meetings are tentatively scheduled for Tuesdays, at 7:00 PM Central time. Attendance at the live meetings is optional (unless you will be presenting) and will be archived for future reference. But, we have found that students enjoy the Wimba meetings and learn from peer interaction and discussion. This meeting time also allows students to ask questions about upcoming assignments to clarify understanding of the requirements for projects and other assignments. Therefore, attendance at the meetings is highly encouraged. Should you be unable to attend, you will be required to listen to the archived meeting and respond to the discussion in a class email in order to fulfill the requirements for class participation.

The first Wimba meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, January 27 at 7:00 PM Central time.

Course Objectives:  The student should be able to:

  1. Identify and apply major theoretical perspectives, as related to child development including Behaviorist, Maturationist, and constructivist approaches.
  2. Develop personal and professional beliefs about development reflecting major theoretical perspectives
  3. Understand and explore the effect of the cultural context regarding major theories
  4. Familiarize key concepts and principles of critical theory and critical pedagogy
  5. develop and improve doctoral students’ skills in writing coherent, reflective, and scholarly essays and papers

 
 
Course Supplies
Course Text Book:

Required Texts

Bodrova, E. & Leong, D. (2007) Tools of the Mind, Second Edition, Pearson/ Merrill/ Prentice Hall.

Mooney, C. (2006) An Introduction to Dewey, Montessori, Erikson, Piaget & Vygotsky, Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall.

Roopnarine, J. & Johnson, J. (2006). Approaches to Early Childhood Education. Upper Saddle River, NJ : Merrill Prentice Hall.

Wurm, J. P. (2005). Working in the Reggio Way. Washington DC: NAEYC.

Recommended Texts


Berk, L.E.,& Winsler, A. (1995). Scaffolding Children’s Learning: Vygotsky and Early Childhood Education. Washington DC: NAEYC.

Follari, L. M. (2007). Foundation and Best Practices in Early Childhood Education. Upper Saddle River, NJ : Merrill Prentice Hall.

 Kincheloe, J. L. (2004) Critical Pedagogy. New York, NY: Peter Lang Palmer

Recommended Journals

 

  1. Journal of Early Childhood Research
  2. American Journal of Educational Research
  3. International Journal of Educational Research
  4. Child Development Journal (Society of Research in Child Development)
  5. Early Childhood Research Quarterly

 
Recommended Websites:

Society of  Research in Child Development             
srcd.org

  1. Sage Journals Online
    Sagepublications.com
  2. National Association for the Education of Young Children
    Naeyc.org
  3. National Association of Teachers in Early Childhood Education: NAECTE Journal of Research
Email Account: Very important course information is communicated to you via email. It is crucial that you have a gmail account because we communicate and use Google applications. While a gmail account is not necessary to use some Google apps, it makes working collaboratively much easier. More information will be provided in the Technology Orientatio

Hardware: You are advised to closely read the information listed at
http://www.telecampus.utsystem.edu/technicalinformation.aspx and act accordingly. In this class you need to connect your computer to Horizon Wimba Live Classroom. To do so, you will need: (1) a headset with a microphone and (2) a wired Internet connection, preferably broadband. Broadband connection is highly recommended because one dial-up user may slow down the communication speed for everyone. Additionally, please allow time to install necessary free plug-ins before you are first scheduled to use Wimba. For a tutorial on connecting to Wimba for the first time please go to the Technology Orientation Project.

We are lucky to be "pioneers" in online education during this time of rapidly evolving technology. At the same time, we sometimes have to be patient as technology does not behave quite the way it was "advertised." Expect some minor frustrations as we work our way through using a system that is not quite up to holodeck standards. (Those Trekkies out there know what I am talking about.) We are on the beginning voyage into this emerging technology field. But, we will go through it together - and in my experience have a great deal of fun learning how to make an imperfect system work well for us. Be patient and look forward to this as a time to grow and use a technology tool that very few people even realize exist and even fewer online programs utilize.
Digital Library: You will need to access the Digital_Library at various times during the cours. We encourage you to take advantage of this opportunity to access scholarly journals for use during your program. In addition, you will be required to review and critique tutorials that are available at the Digital Library as well as other tutorials that are available for critiquing.
SMARTHINKING: SMARTHINKING is your source for 24 X 7 online tutoring. While they cannot help you with your technology projects, we HIGHLY recommend that you use the services for any writing assignments you may have to submit. You will generally get results from a a certified tutor within 24 hours of submission. You may submit questions in addition to submitting essays to the SMARTHINKING tutors. Access this resource by opening the TeleCampus page or through the menu bar to the left. We will discuss this in Wimba before you begin submitting papers.
Safe Assign: This provider will allow you to submit your papers to ensure that you are not plagiarizing anything in your document. Once you submit the assignment, you will have to email the instructor to send you the information regarding your paper. We will discuss this in Wimba before you begin submitting papers
 

 

 
 
Course Requirements
Please see Calendar for important (due) dates and stick to the Calendar.

In order to come prepared for course activities, you should have completed the week's assignments before the class or the group meets.

All projects are due by Midnight on the due date, generally falling on a Sunday. This gives you the weekend, if necessary to finalize projects. Projects turned in after midnight on the Official Due Date without a documented reason will have one letter grade deducted from the final project grade.

If projects are two weeks late, they will not be accepted.

It is important to maintain contact with your instructor if you have challenges or concerns about completing the course work in a timely manner.
 
Modes of Communication

Overview: Throughout this graduate-level course you will communicate with your instructor and your peers in a variety of ways:

  • Phone conferences
  • Online discussions in Horizon Wimba Live Classroom
  • Email correspondences
  • Course wiki and group wiki
  • Google collaborative tools
  • Face-to-face meetings (certainly not mandatory, but when possible)

Phone Conferences: Call the instructor at (956) 882-5710 if you wish. If the instructor is not available, please leave a short message with your return number. Please enunciate your callback number slowly.

Online Discussions: The class is scheduled to meet in Horizon Wimba Live Classroom approximately once every week. Other modes of communication may also be used as they become available. Each tool will be introduced with a tutorial provided ahead of time when needed and practice will be planned.

Email Correspondence: Very important course information is communicated to you via email. It is crucial that you check your email on a daily basis. You may also contact your instructor via email. While we make every effort to respond within 24-hours (and usually much sooner), sometimes glitches cause the email to go awry. Please do not assume we are ignoring you if you do not hear from us. Please re-send your email with Second Attempt in the subject line so that we may respond to you.

IMPORTANT Please note: It is critical that you go through the Orientation activity to ensure that you can receive emails from the course listserv.

Formatting for all class Emails: To enable everyone in the class to easily organize emails, please include the course number, your name, and then the subject of your email in the subject line: 6301 Georgianna - Your topic here. If you do not include the course number and your name, it may be inadvertently overlooked and thus take longer to receive a response.

Course wiki and group wiki: You will be accessing the course wiki at http://edec6301.pbwiki.com/. Critical information about accessing and using the wiki is provided in the Orientation Project.

You will be completing a collaborative group project. For this project, you will be creating and using your own wiki. We recommend that you use PB wiki because you will be familiar with its use, but you may use any of the free or paid subscription wiki services that are available.

Face-to-Face Meetings: While not mandatory, we would be happy to meet anyone face-to-face if needed or wanted. Please contact the instructor by email or phone to set up a time to meet.
 

Student FTP Web Publishing:

The UT TeleCampus (UTTC) provides Web publishing space for all students for the purpose of storing and publishing your student projects and portfolios. This space is known as the Komodo, Gemini or Blue server. For more detailed information about FTP web publishing, please refer to the Technology Orientation project found by clicking on the Projects link in the left sidebar menu.
 

Technical Support:

For technical support contact UTB help desk http://myutbtsc.blackboard.com/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_id=_182_1

 
 
Evaluation:

Projects: In addition to the Technology Orientation, you are expected to complete three article critiques, two film critiques, and a book critique.  All projects must be completed to a satisfactory degree (see the Projects link in the sidebar for instructions) and turned in by the due date (see Calendar).

Specifically, the topics for the three article critiques are:

1. Historical Perspective of one of the Learning Theories

2. Behaviorist Theory

3. Article "Theory Lead To Practice" by Leslie R. Williams

The two film critiques are based on the Following Films:

1. Where do Children Play?

2. Partnership With Parents

Book Critique:

Students must find a book relevant to the material covered in class and submit it for approval for the instructor. After reading the book you must complete the book review and turn it in by the due date.

These projects do not require collaboration with other students, so please take this opportunity to demonstrate your individual interpretive and creative skills in your products.

Reading Assignments:  It is expected that students will complete reading assignments on time and be prepared to discuss what they have read. The professor will provide both preview and review lectures and respond to questions and written assignments from the readings. Students will participate in small group and whole class discussions of the articles and book chapters. Some linguistics exercises will be done in class. To complete the exercises, students will need to have read the assigned chapters.

Participation: Your class participation in this graduate course is a vital part of your distance education experience. It allows you to share your ideas with your instructor and your fellow students. Class participation is a required component of this course and refers to your contribution to class/group meetings and presentations. You will be given credit for your participation in the wimba sessions. If you are absent or if you come to class late or unprepared for discussions, you won’t receive points for participation. If you know you need to miss a class, please discuss this with me in advance so I can send you any handouts or assignments. Papers are still due on the assigned dates, even if you are absent. All projects, interviews, and papers should be e-mailed

Weekly class meetings are scheduled for meeting and for presenting. At least once during the semester, you will be required to present online. It is mandatory that you be at the session in which you are scheduled to present. Please contact the instructor for options if you are unable to attend .

If you cannot attend a meeting(s), you must listen to the archived meeting and provide a response to the discussion by sending a general email to all in the class. You will NOT receive credit for participation if you do not either attend the meeting or respond to the archived meetings within one week of the meeting date.

Late Projects: One letter grade will be deducted from

Evaluation: Grades for the semester will be derived as follows:

 

1. Assessments: Three Quizzes - 20%
20%
2. Projects:

Three article critiques 30%

Two Film Critiques - 10%

Book Critique - 20%
60%
3. Other Activities: Class Participation - 20%
20%

Grade Distribution:

90% - 100%
=
A
80% - 89%
=
B
70% - 79%
=
C
60% - 69%
=
D
Below 60

=
F

A Outstanding scholarship. Performance that significantly exceeds the requirements and qualitative expectations of the course. Superior mastery of subject matter.  Initiative and self-direction leading to significant study and related activity beyond course requirements.
B Good Scholarship. Performance that fully meets all the requirements and qualitative expectations of the Course. Solid mastery of subject matter.
C Marginal Scholarship. Performance that meets the requirements and qualitative expectations of the course but does not indicate solid mastery.
 
Academic Dishonesty Statement:

Students are expected to be above reproach in all scholastic activities. Students who engage in scholastic dishonesty are subject to disciplinary penalties, including the possibility of failure in the course and dismissal from the university. "Scholastic dishonesty includes but is not limited to cheating, plagiarism, collusion, the submission for credit of any work or materials that are attributable in whole or in part to another person, taking an examination for another person, any act designed to give unfair advantage to a student or the attempt to commit such acts." Regents' Rules and Regulations, Series 50101, Section 2.2.

Since scholastic dishonesty harms the individual, all students, and the integrity of the university, policies on scholastic dishonesty will be strictly enforced (refer to Student Handbook for more information).

The issue of academic dishonestly is critical in regards to writing and plagiarism - or projects and plagiarism. The first instance will result in a "0" for the project without the recourse of re-submitting the work for a passing grade; the second instance in a "0" for the course. Simply stated, "Don't do

Disabilities Statement:

Students with disabilities, including learning disabilities, who wish to request academic adjustments in this class, should notify the Disability Services Office in the semester so that the appropriate accommodations may be made. In accordance with federal law, a student requesting academic adjustments must provide documentation of his/her disability to the Disability Services Counselor. For more information, call or visit the Counseling Center Cardenas North 103, (956) 882-8292 or email steve.wilder@utb.edu.

Emergency Statement:

This UTB graduate distance education class is facilitated via the UT TeleCampus (UTTC). This allows faculty members and students to continue their teaching and learning via UTTC Blackboard http://uttc.blackboard.com, whether or not the university shuts down as a result of a hurricane or any other natural disaster.

Should any disaster occurs, announcements will be made within Blackboard. To facilitate the completion of classes, most or all of the communication between students and the institution, the instructor, and fellow classmates will take place using the features in your UTTC Blackboard.

To receive credit for a course, it is the student’s responsibility to complete all the requirements for that course. Failure to access course materials once reasonably possible can result in a reduction of your overall grade in the class.