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SPED7000 Assessment and Evaluation in Special Education
Assessment and Evaluation in Special Education is designed for candidates who will engage in the process of evaluation, identification and treatment of students with learning disabilities. Candidates will be provided with the foundation for understanding all aspects of educational assessment methods and procedures used in the evaluation for students with exceptional learning needs. This course will explore numerous evaluation instruments, as well as to provide hands-on review and practice of various current assessment tools. Legal issues, selection of assessment tools, proper test administration, scoring, report writing and team meeting presentation are among areas that will be introduced to candidates.

 

SPED 8022 Augmentative and Alternative Communication
Candidates will examine communication options for individuals who are unable to meet their daily communication needs through speech. Emphasis will be placed on conceptual and technical aspects of augmentative and alternative communication as well as intervention strategies and procedures used by teachers when supporting and expanding the individual's ability to communicate.

Classroom Management and Community Building for Early Childhood Education (PreK-3)
EDUC 7000
This course is designed to help educators of young children (PK-3rd Grade) manage a classroom setting while also providing opportunities for students to mange their own behavior. It is designed to deepen your understanding of community building and recognize its crucial role in creating a safe and respectful learning environment. Based on the Cooperative Discipline method and the Responsive Classroom model, this course will help teachers avoid power struggles and create an environment where students can function, learn, and thrive in an urban or suburban setting via community building activities. At the completion of this course you will have a skill set and materials that will help you in your classroom management.

The content and skills mastered in this course enable the candidates: [1] to become more aware of how to manage young children based on current research, models and techniques, thus enhancing their ability to effectively run a classroom; and [2] to improve their own instructional practice by developing a deeper knowledge of the content area.

Curriculum and Technology
IDIS Topics
This course looks at the integration of educational technology in the classroom and its relationship to effective, child-centered learning. Participants will explore the use of the Internet as a classroom resource, the hardware and software necessary to go online, search engines browsers, URL’s, online journals, education websites, online interest groups, and will develop the skills needed to design a WebQuest, a Powerpoint presentation, and lesson plans with technology integration. This course will enable participants to integrate curriculum and instructional technology that enables students to develop in-depth projects pertaining to their own grade level, academic discipline, or school-based priorities. Participants will develop advanced projects by using a multiplicity of technologies and present their results through multimedia formats. Participants will develop projects that require direct involvement with students in their own classrooms. Participants will make use of advanced telecommunication platforms such as BlackBoard.com to engage in online asynchronous threaded discussions and virtual groups.

Developing 21st Century Skills through Community Service Learning
EDUC 7000
This course is designed to provide teachers with an understanding of 21st Century skills and how they can be integrated into their existing curriculum. teachers will develop their expertise in creating community service learning experiences that will foster these 21st century skills. the course will provide teachers core strategies and best practices that will assist them in working more effectively with students, parents and community.

Discrete Mathematics with Applications for the Middle and High School Teacher
EDUC 7000
This course is designed to cover topics in Discrete Mathematics by exploring the connection between Discrete Mathematics and real-life conditions. Some of the topics covered will include: Estate Division, Election Theory, Weighed Voting, Fair Division, Matrices, Mathematical Induction, Recursion, Combinatorics and Probability, Codes, Pascal, Euler and Hamiltonian Circuits, Graphs and Networks, Traveling Salesman Problem, Critical Path and Graph Coloring.

Empowering Teachers & Students through Character Education
This course explores the dimensions of character education and social-emotional programs. In today's world, children are often attending school with problematic behaviors and attitudes. Children are confronted with teasing, taunting, bullying, harassment and exclusion at an early age. Therefore, character education and social-emotional Programs have become a necessity in schools to support and promote the social and mental/emotional development of children.

Participants will examine various theories and practices of Character Education and identify Social Emotional Programs that can be integrated into a safe, caring and cooperative classroom and school environment. This course will assist educators to prepare lessons and materials, analyze and critique lessons, children's literature, and curriculum programs that could be used in their classrooms.

Having Conversations with Difficult Students
EDUC 7000
This course will provide classroom teachers grades K-12 with insight into different psychological perspectives, most importantly Narrative Therapy. This more in depth view of the individual can be used as a tool assisting with classroom discipline. The course will allow teachers to become more knowledgeable about personality theories along with treatment modalities such as Narrative Therapy and Self-Psychology. Participants will have the opportunity to discuss and learn more about how personalities and environmental factors make their way into the classroom, is the disruptive student. A better understanding of “acting out” behavior via an eclectic approach along with real case examples will enhance ones ability to intervene with the difficult student more effectively.

Issues in Adolescent Literacy
EDUC 7000
This course will introduce middle and high school teachers to the construct of Adolescent Literacy and suggest solutions to the literacy problems unique to adolescence. Course participants will investigate concepts of:

• The Role of Motivation and Self-Efficacy in Adolescent Literacy
• Assessing Adolescent Literacy
• Teaching Adolescents with Literacy Difficulties
• Strategies for Adolescent English-Language Learners
• Specific Strategies in Literacy Domains

In addition to the required course text, students will be provided with a variety of documents through the Course Documents section of this on-line course. Students will work with a variety of sources to construct a paper which will eventually describe their personal understanding of the concept of Adolescent Literacy. They will produce a lesson plan specific to their content area which illustrates their knowledge and comprehension of the concepts presented.

Language Development, Differences and Disorders
SPED 8300
This course addresses normal development of receptive and expressive language in terms of phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics. It focuses on the language performance exhibited by different populations of children/adults with disabilities. The language of the bilingual-bicultural children and language disordered adolescents are addressed. Students develop an understanding of the principles and practices related to assessment and intervention for children with language disorders. Students assess language needs and plan appropriate strategies.

Methods and Materials in ESL
ENGL 8042
The major methodological approaches to teaching English as a Second Language, including an historical survey and a review of current applications, are explored in this course. The following topics are discussed: interactive, communicative classroom practices, teaching reading and writing, listening, oral communication, grammar, and vocabulary, testing and designing and evaluating classroom materials.

Psychology of Reading, Reading Development and Disabilities
READ 7017 3 cr.
This course is designed to provide students with an understanding of the reading process and its developmental progression. Students will examine reading models, review research related to reading psychology and identify characteristics of proficient and non-proficient readers.

Reviving Character Education in the Classroom and as School and Community Initiatives
EDUC 7000
This course is designed for educators to explore the dimensions of Character Education and the role of educators in developing moral and ethical behavior in their students. Children’s beliefs about what is right and wrong traditionally have been strongly influenced by their families. However, with today’s family structure and the influences of the popular culture, children are often attending school with problematic behaviors and attitudes. Therefore, Character Education has become a necessity in schools to support and promote social, emotional and ethical development in children.

Participants will examine various theories and practices of Character Education and identify skills that can be integrated into a caring and cooperative classroom and school environment. Educators will identify their own personal character traits and be an effective model for their students. This course will assist educators in preparing lessons and materials, and analyze and critique lessons, children’s literature, and curriculum programs that could be used in their classrooms. It is the intent that this course will carry over to the classroom, the entire school, and the community.

Technology Skill Building and Curriculum Integration
EDUC 7000
This course is designed to provide teachers the opportunity to build and strengthen technology skills needed to develop technology enhanced curriculum projects. Teachers will examine strategies implemented through the use of applications software, free downloadable software and current Internet resources. These strategies will be used to design technology rich lessons that integrate technology in ways that enhance and extend instructional and learning opportunities. Components of the curriculum development include: setting goals and objectives, instructional planning and implementation, and assessment and evaluation. The curriculum projects will follow the guidelines set forth in the Massachusetts Technology Literacy Standards and Expectations.

Twentieth Century Spain: A Survey of History, Culture and Literature
EDUC7000
This course is designed to give Spanish teachers an introduction, brief overview and/or refresher into some major personalities, historical themes, cultural and literary themes of Spain in the Twentieth Century. This course will help to provide a well-rounded view of Contemporary Spain in order to impart this to their own future students. Topics covered will include but are not limited to Pedro Almodovar, The Spanish Civil War, Ana Maria Matute, Federico Garcia Lorca, Picasso, and Dali.

Understanding the Structure of the English Language
SPED/READ 7016
This course examines linguistic structure of modern English and applies this knowledge to classroom instruction. The course begins by comparing previous historical knowledge about the nature of language with today's current theoretical issues. Next, we will particularly describe modern English in terms of its linguistic structure, the sound system, English spelling, morphology, the semantic system and word formation, grammar, and sentence structure.

 

 

 

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