This unit will provide pre-service teachers with the opportunity to engage with current knowledge and understanding about the structure and substance of English as a discipline, children’s language development, and pedagogical approaches for improving their levels of communication in English. The unit will focus on developing and applying the pre-service teachers’ knowledge and understanding about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and Christian perspectives on English content and pedagogies. Pre-service teachers will also engage with and develop their knowledge of the current curriculum for English.
Through this unit pre-service teachers will critically analyse and develop pedagogies for assessing students’ learning needs in relation to reading, comprehension, writing, speaking and listening, and for developing effective learning experiences that will engage and cater for diverse students in order to extend and enhance their language, literature and literacy knowledge, understanding and skills, including multi-literacies. The unit will explore a range of resources for engaging and supporting students in their learning in English.
Pre-service teachers will develop their personal competence in utilising ICT for educational purposes in order to enhance students’ learning in English and in ICTs. This unit will also include advanced instruction towards developing pre-service teachers’ personal proficiencies in the areas of English language, literature and literacy. The unit incorporates Christian faith, worldview and Scripture related to the teaching vocation.
Topics:
1. Language Acquisition stages and development
2. Overview of the Victorian Primary English Curriculum
3. Reading -teaching and learning theories
4. Reading – assessment of and learning strategies for differentiated needs
5. Approaches to learning writing and spelling
6. Approaches to learning oral communication
7. How to integrate great books and poems in your program
8. Examining various case studies of best practice of programming across the week, term, year
