Education Commons^™

Improving The Quality Of Field Experiences: A Program Improvement Plan, Cody Geisler

Master's Theses & Capstone Projects

For early childhood education students, field experiences are a critical component of applying content knowledge to real-world experience in the classroom. The problem is the number of field experience hours does not assure quality learning for the early childhood education student. A review of literature on the topic of quality field experiences revealed a need for scaffolded experiences, positive relationships with mentor teachers and integration of reflective practice. 13 participating mentor teachers and 14 students currently enrolled in the early childhood education program at Minnesota North College were surveyed to collect data related to scaffolded experiences, mentor teacher roles and …

Unraveling Universalist Perspectives On Teaching And Caring For Infants And Toddlers: Finding Authenticity In Diverse Funds Of Knowledge, Susan L. Recchia, Seung Eun Mcdevitt

Education Specialties Faculty Publications

Although child-rearing beliefs and practices vary widely across cultures, a dominant discourse on how to teach and care for young children undergirds most early childhood teacher education programs. In this qualitative multicase study, the authors explored the ways that immigrant preservice teachers negotiated their emerging teacher identities across discontinuities between their own funds of knowledge and the theory and practice presented in their infant and toddler practicum course. Using a funds of identity framework, the authors drew on multiple data sources to examine how three immigrant students questioned, complicated, expanded on, connected, and/or denied their funds of knowledge as they …

Overview Of Early Childhood Education In China, India, Ethiopia, And Tanzania., Judit Szente, X. Christine Wang, Belete Mebratu, Fortidas Bakuza

Institute for Educational Development, East Africa

This paper introduces the status of early childhood education in China, India, Ethiopia, and Tanzania over the past 25 years while sharing crucial new policies targeting early childhood (EC) education and EC teacher education. The paper targets four main areas such as :

1) opportunities for quality pre- and in-service training of EC teachers;

2) distribution/availability of quality EC teachers;

3) perceived status of EC teachers; and

4) financial support for EC education in each country.

Conclusions and recommendations for the Post-2015 area are also provided.