BS in Early Childhood Education

The Early Childhood Education program prepares students to teach preschool through second grade, and to achieve Massachusetts licensure. Students take classes that focus on the content and pedagogy of early childhood education. A sequence of 3 field-based courses provides students the opportunity to put course content into practice. This progression begins in our Early Childhood Learning Lab, a demonstration preschool, and continues through public school placement in kindergarten and first or second grade. Students are supported in the field by frequent supervisory visits from instructors, who also teach the seminar component of the courses. In meetings following observations, the instructors provide feedback and assist students in analyzing their work. Instructors use situations from the students’ direct experiences to provide relevant topics for discussion that enrich the seminars. The goal of this program is to offer an education that enables students to become knowledgeable, highly skilled, and reflective teachers of young children.

Undergraduate Professional Coursework

• SED EC 305 Child Development and Early Childhood Education
• SED EC 350 Introduction to Early Childhood Education
• SED EC 405 Curriculum and Fieldwork: Preschool
• SED EC 453 Curriculum and Practicum: Kindergarten
• SED EC 553 Early Childhood Seminar and Practicum: Grades 1/2
• SED EC 557 Classroom-Based Assessment of Young Children
• SED ED 100 Introduction to Education
• SED ED 101 Education Lab
• SED ED 410 Social Context of Education
• SED ED 412 Civic Context of Education
• SED SE 250 Disability, Education, and Public Policy

Early Childhood Learning Laboratory (ECLL)

The ECLL is a demonstration preschool that serves as a field placement for all early childhood majors and an observation site for teaching and research purposes. Twenty-two children, ages 2.9 – 5 are in the program; a number of them have first languages other than English. There are microphones strategically placed in the classroom and digital recorders in the Observation Room so that classroom activities can be recorded and analyzed by early childhood faculty and student teachers. In addition, there is a resource center for preparing teaching materials that is available to all early childhood students.