ECE 460 Teaching STEAM in ECE
Course Description: This course emphasizes an integrated approach to early childhood curriculum development for young children. Relates early childhood pedagogy, research, and content areas of science, mathematics, engineering, technology, and art to STEAM project-based, integrated and inquiry curriculum designs.
Textbook Required (one):
Course textbook is in https://tophat.com/students/. Wait to purchase Top Hat until you receive further instructions.
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First reading assignment Zan & Greiten. (2010). Ramps & Pathways: Developmentally Appropriate, Intellectually Rigorous, and Fun Physical Science. Young Children 65(1) 12-17.
Bring blocks, cardboard, and small round objects, like matchbox cars, to play with to our Ramps & Pathways class.
DISCUSSION: What kinds of learning happens here?Complete a LESSON PLAN for our Ramps & Pathways event on the first day of class. You are writing a documentation of learning, after the fact, but using a PLANNING form as if you were preparing for your students’ active learning using Ramps & Pathways. LessonPlanFormatRAMPSPATHWAYS.docx
One recent student comment: “I enjoyed how the first day of class was a hands-on activity that required lots of movements, even as college students that is exactly what we need, it was probably one of my favorites from the class.”
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Curriculum – What is curriculum? What elements are included?
Curriculum is the WHAT of instruction (the content, the standards, and the measurable skills learners acquire), which is one strand of great teaching, along with the WHY (philosophical and theoretical framework, the ‘View of the Child as a Learner’), and the HOW (methodology).
Developmentally Appropriate Practice, or DAP – this is a guiding document, published and revised regularly by the National Association for the Education of Young Children www.naeyc.org/dap. Their 3 Core Considerations and 9 Principles inform teachers, curriculum designers, and professors in a basic foundation of principles and practices. Here is where we have written more about DAP recently http://faculty.tamuc.edu/jthompson/dap.
Texas Infant Toddler Early Learning Guidelines ITELG https://childrenslearninginstitute.org/resources/itelg/
Texas Prekindergarten Guidelines - for learners in Texas Public School PK3 (3 year old) and PK4 (4 year olds)
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills TEKS https://tea.texas.gov/curriculum/teks for grades Kindergarten to Grade 12, end of course objectives.
TEA TEKS Guide https://www.teksguide.org/
Early Childhood Vertical Alignments https://tea.texas.gov/academics/early-childhood-education/vertical-alignments – Infant/Toddler Early Learning Guidelines, Prekindergarten Guidelines, Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (Kindergarten, First, and Second Grades)
TEKS Resource System https://teksresourcesystem.net
Lead4ward - https://lead4ward.com and their TEKS SNAPSHOTS, per grade level and by subject https://lead4ward.com/resources/
TEKS App https://masteryconnect.com/
English Language Proficiency Standards ELPS http://ipsi.utexas.edu/EST/files/standards/ELPS/ELPS.pdf
Short video describing the English Language Proficiency Standards (ELPS) in Texas and why they are important. https://youtu.be/VafI5-Dwc4E
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Texas Examination of Educator Standards TExES
Official website for authentic Preparation Materials https://www.tx.nesinc.com/TestView.aspx?f=HTML_FRAG/TX391_PrepMaterials.html
Texas A&M University System’s TExES Certification Exam Review for Teachers (T-CERT) https://pact.tarleton.edu/tcert/index.cfm
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Planning an INQUIRY-BASED INTEGRATED UNIT
Start with choosing a theme - As part of our exploration of Inquiry-based learning, we watched this video https://vimeo.com/31158841. We watched the same video three times, asking 1. What? and then 2. Why? and finally 3. How? Use this series of W- questions to wonder about your chosen topic.
Form a group of 5 to 6 class members. Choose a topic of interest, following the outline from Krogh, ch 4 on Units and Themes, and ch 5 Inquiry-based learning. Select a grade level (circle): I/T PK K 1-2 3-4 5-6 .
DISCUSSION: 460ProjectBrainstormSheet.docx
DISCUSSION: Using a broad thematic topic, find and talk about subtopics that you suppose would provide special interest as well as motivation for young learners to do further and more in-depth studies. Revisit this question after reading the section in Krogh & Morehouse ch. 5 that discusses criteria for topic selection of inquiry-based learning projects.
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Explore these Nine Principles of Montessori Education (Lillard, 2016) http://faculty.tamuc.edu/jthompson/Montessori/documents/LillardMontessori9Principles.ppt
Read my 2003 article on how my Montessori kindergarten chose a project based on interests, and then explored the hundred languages of creativity and investigation http://faculty.tamuc.edu/jthompson/documents/Thompson2003HundredLanguageZoo.pdf
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Te Whariki
Something of great interest to early childhood educators worldwide is the phenomenal approach adopted by the New Zealand Ministry of Education in 2017 with the adoption of Te Whariki as an indigenous guide to educating all young children. These ideals may be of particular interest in your design of a Pijin Play and Learn Scope and Sequence.
Some principles of Te Whariki that translate universally include:
- All children will be empowered to learn with and alongside others by engaging in experiences that have meaning for them.
- Children intellectual, social, cultural, physical, emotional and spiritual learning is interwoven across all their experiences. A child's family, whānau and community are recognised as part of the learning experience.
- The five strands of Te Whāriki are Wellbeing | Mana atua, Belonging | Mana whenua, Contribution | Mana tangata, Communication | Mana reo and Exploration | Mana aotūroa. Each strand has dual English and Māori names; while closely related, different cultural connotations mean the two are not equivalents.
