W.R. Ducett, Thomas Haynes, & Gary O’Malley, Curriculum & Instruction
Faced with the dilemma of providing appropriate clinical settings for pre-service teachers, the secondary education faculty brainstormed ideas for solutions. What resulted was a curricular innovation that combined two courses that share the same instructor and clinical site. In an integrated curricular approach two courses, C&I 214 Content Literacy and C&I 216 Secondary Teaching Methods, were taught in a block that met four periods per week. The courses had similar and connected objectives and assignments that required student lesson design and implementation in a high school classroom. The presenters will discuss the modifications needed to blend two courses sharing a clinical requirement, explain the advantages of blocking two courses with relevant and high stakes clinical components, and summarize the positive student and faculty responses to the initial pilot in the spring semester of 2006. The rationale for the integrated class, the ways in which the course content and activities were reconfigured, and the research data compiled from course evaluations and satisfaction surveys from spring and fall 2006 will be shared with the program participants.
