Pedagogical Core: Four Courses, 12 credit hours
ED 610 Dynamics and Management in the Secondary Classroom (3 credit hours)
This course examines the major factors which contribute to effective management in a diverse classroom environment: spatial concerns and configurations, a positive learning climate, differentiated instruction, communication patterns and skills, behavior management techniques, development and presentation of appropriate and professional attitudes, understanding at-risk behavior, and strategies for dealing with at-risk students and students with personal problems.
ED 611 Information Literacy and Technology (3 credit hours)
This course assists teachers in finding and using information effectively and efficiently to enhance their content-area instruction and professional development. It also prepares teachers to effectively teach these skills and abilities to their students. Strategies for appropriate information retrieval and use will include both practical hands-on work and reflective writing in order to develop an educational framework for information. In addition, legal and ethical issues surrounding the use of information will also be covered.
ED 612 Multicultural Teaching Methods (3 credit hours)
This course will focus on the diversity of schools and the community, and will provide candidates with information about effective teaching in a diverse classroom. The importance of taking responsibility for the education of all students will be stressed as well as the need to establish challenging and appropriate expectations for all. The New York State Learning Standards will be considered as they pertain to cultural diversity and various curriculum areas. The role of family, peers, parental involvement, and poverty in both overall society as well as the culture of schooling will be studied. Effective techniques for communicating with students and families will be examined. In addition, candidates will analyze their own personal values in relation to multicultural issues of society and education.
EDU 615 Research Methods (3 credit hours)
Prepares candidates with the critical skills needed to be an informed practitioner and critical consumer of information. In this course candidates will develop an understanding of the research process, both qualitative and quantitative, including formulating a research problem, data analysis, and interpretation. Since leaders in the field are increasingly relying on research results for improving school practices, candidates will learn how to critically analyze research studies, review ethical considerations in conducting research and discuss the importance of scientific research for education policy and practice. As a culminating course experience, candidates will plan a research project consistent with their interest and the course goals. In this course candidates will be encouraged to serve the education field by active supporting and participating in research and to join their subject area professional organization, which promotes a lifelong dedication to knowledge and professional development. [Note: Candidates planning to take EDAD 625 should inform the instructor and plan to complete a research proposal based on the action research model.]
Education Elective: Choose one course, 3 credit hours
EDA 610 School Law (3 credit hours)
Principles of public school law with a focus on NYS Education Law and select federal and state cases affecting the administration of our educational system. Topics include student residency, attendance and discipline; freedom of speech; search and seizure; FERPA; IDEA; LRE; employee rights.
EDAD 620 Assessment and Accountability in Education (3 credit hours)
Federal mandates for increased standardized testing and subsequent funding for schools is meant to increase individual school district accountability for student performance. Candidates will become familiar with the standardized tests for middle and high schools students in New York State. They will also learn how to report and interpret the results of these standardized tests. Candidates will understand the value of using data and other assessment methods (i.e., curriculum mapping) to demonstrate teacher effectiveness and student learning, empowering them to be educational leaders in their area of expertise. Application of descriptive statistical methods including central tendencies, standard deviation, correlation coefficients and standard scores will be addressed. The elements of test construction, including reliability, validity and item analysis will be considered. Candidates will use statistical software to analyze student scores on various tests.
EDAD 621 Comparative Education (3 credit hours)
Most educators today are aware of the global forces that affect their work—be it in terms of the rising emphasis on technology and information in the classroom, the aggressive policies on preparing children and nations for a competitive international economy, or issues raised by an increasingly diverse population of students. Yet, for the most part, our growing sense of the global dimension of domestic educational issues has not been accompanied by attention to formal, cross-national comparisons of educational systems. This course is designed for (a) students who are interested in studying education and education policy in an international or comparative setting, and (b) students who would like to understand the American educational system by way of comparing across educational systems. Another important purpose of the course is to help students new to the study of education begin developing their own philosophy and theory of education. Course assignments are designed to introduce the topic of international and comparative education and to systematically develop the tools and methods for informed thinking about education in a global era. Companion Travel Course Option.
EDU 514 Contemporary Issues in Education (3 credit hours)
This course is designed to prepare teachers to take a leadership role by analyzing factors which have an impact upon schools as change agents within society: cultural perspectives, political agendas, local and national concerns. Topics may include standardized testing, unionization, school violence, and tenure.
EDAD 625 Research in Action [Prerequisite: EDU615] (3 credit hours)
This course provides an opportunity for candidates to conduct an action research project based on their research proposal developed in EDU615. The approach of action research is to analyze practice to determine its effectiveness. Building on their research proposal, candidates will collect data appropriate for their study, using an appropriate measurement tool. Data analysis using correct statistical testing procedures, as well as interpretation and discussion of the findings will be included in the final research report. Candidates will present their findings to the academic community and submit their papers for publication in a relevant journal.
Content Area: Choose four courses, 12 credit hours
HIS 602 Content and Themes in American History (3 credit hours)
Designed for current social studies teachers at the secondary level, this content-based course will provide additional background in a number of the major topics in American History, including: slavery, the Constitution, and the Cold War. The course will also consider various methods for applying content in the classroom.
HIS 604 Current Themes in Global History (3 credit hours)
The course will combine historiographical content issues with pedagogy in a number of selected topics in global studies. Candidates will be encouraged to implement innovative teaching strategies as a means to acquaint their students with the full range of current thinking in world history. As a graduate course, the emphasis is upon discussion and individual research and initiative.
HIS 608 Topics in Immigration and Ethnicity: The Hyphenated American (3 credit hours)
This course provides historical context to current questions on multicultural America and will be organized to provide comparative perspective on the different historical experiences of the Irish, Italian, Jewish, German, British, Chinese, Polish, and Africans in 19th and 20th century America. Themes that will provide insight into acculturation and assimilation to American life include family, work, gender, religion, education, community organization, residential patterns, mobility, and political participation. Attention will be paid to developing primary sources and how they might be used in the classroom in a variety of ways. Sources include census and passenger lists, memoirs, fiction, film, oral history, and a critical evaluation of available on-line sources.
HIS 609 Topics in American Women’s History (3 credit hours)
This course will focus on main themes in American women's history including politics, work, family and sex as described through the critical lens of ethnic and racial experience. Attention will be paid to developing primary sources to be used in a variety of ways in the classroom. Sources include diaries, letters, prescriptive and magazine literature, census material, memoirs, fiction, oral interviews, film and decorative arts. Course will include an optional field trip to the Women's Rights Historic Park in Seneca Falls.
HIS 620 The Irish Famine (3 credit hours)
The “Great Hunger” of 1846-1850 was the defining moment in the history of modern Ireland. The failure of successive potato crops created a famine which caused the death of a significant portion of the Irish population and thereby brought dramatic changes to Irish society and politics. The Famine also caused a dramatic increase in Irish emigration and led to the emergence of large and influential Irish communities in both the United States and Canada. The Famine is therefore an important topic in American as well as European history. Candidates will examine the economic, social, and political context in which the Famine occurred, and will investigate the role that ethnic and religious prejudices, as well as adherence to laissez-faire economic theory, played in shaping both Irish and British responses to the crisis. They will consider how the famine altered Irish society and how memories of the famine influenced the development of Irish nationalism both within Ireland and in the communities of the Irish diaspora. Throughout the course, through reading and writing assignments and in class discussions, emphasis will be placed on how study of the Irish famine might be incorporated into the teaching of both American and world history. Particular attention will be paid to the New York State Learning Standards, which cite the famine as a possible case study in civil and human rights. Candidates will also explore the famine as a problem of historical analysis through which middle- and high school students might encounter the concept of multiple causation, the issue of incomplete and conflicting evidence, and the phenomenon of conflicting historical interpretations.
HIS 621 The British Imperial Experience and its Global Legacy (3 credit hours)
This course examines the history of the British Empire from the sixteenth century “Age of Discovery” through the twentieth-century phenomenon of decolonization. Attention will be paid to the “imperial story” of Britain’s acquisition, administration, and eventual loss of overseas territory, and also to evolving doctrines of imperialism and anti-imperialism, but the course is not designed primarily as a survey. Its goal, rather, is to examine the empire as a political, social, and cultural context in which Europeans and non-Europeans encountered and influenced one another. Therefore emphasis will be placed on how “empire” was experienced by various groups—not only the planters of the Caribbean, but also their African slaves; not only the founders of overseas missions, but also the indigenous elites who were permanently shaped by their contact with western culture; not only Britons who adapted to life in geographic and climatic regions far from “home,” but also Asians, Africans, and others who have become part of the increasingly multiethnic and multicultural society of Britain itself.
HIS 690 Civil Rights Movement (3 credit hours)
This course is devoted to the study of the black civil rights movement, the most important reform in American history. It traces the origin and development of the struggle as it occurred on both the national and local levels. The course aims to evaluate the political and socioeconomic plight of African Americans and to explore the ways in which prominent individuals, grass roots groups, women, newspaper editors, legislators, judges, and presidents advanced or resisted racial justice. Particular attention will also paid to the critical events of the civil rights movement, such as the Brown decision, the Montgomery bus boycott, the integration of Central High School in Little Rock, the Greensboro sit-ins, the Freedom Rides through the Deep South, Project Confrontation in Birmingham, Freedom Summer, the Selma-to-Montgomery march, and the wave of reaction to nonviolent tactics in the form of black nationalism and urban riots. The course will conclude by considering the status of African Americans in today’s society. Content pedagogy will be part of each class, including review of current scholarship so that new interpretations can be presented in secondary classrooms.
HIS 725 Teaching the Holocaust (3 credit hours)
In this course, candidates will learn of some of the most recent developments in research and writing on the history of the Holocaust in addition to considering questions directly related to classroom pedagogy in teaching this critical topic.
PSC 655 Europe Unites: History and Politics of European Integration (3 credit hours)
The first part of this course focuses on the history of European integration from the inter-war period to the present. Blending attention to the domestic politics of major European states, global events, and spread of new political ideas and institutions, this historical overview will help students understand how the European Union (EU) of today has come about and where it might be heading in the future. The second part of the course examines the main governmental institutions of the EU, allowing students to make comparisons to other federal systems, such as the United States. The final part of the course considers the various ways that the EU is important to the United States, particularly in key policy areas such as trade and investment, homeland security, and Middle East peace and stability. Along with its content, this course will also expose students to several different teaching methods, including cooperative team learning, class discussion, Powerpoint presentations, and in-class simulations (an historic “summit” meeting of the European Community as it was prior to 1993 and a contemporary meeting of European leaders will be modeled). Throughout the term, candidates will be asked to reflect on the advantages and disadvantages of using each teaching method in the classroom by preparing short essays that will be discussed in class and submitted to the instructor. Optional Experiential Component Associated with this Course: PSC 655 will be supplemented by an optional travel component to Europe. The candidates will meet the instructor in Brussels, where lodging will be arranged. This 3-day seminar will be highlighted by a guided walking tour of the city and presentations and tours at the European Commission, European Parliament, and US Mission in Brussels.