Curriculum and Course Schedule

This course is designed to explore how the ways that we live culturally provide strengths for teaching, learning and design. The course draws from the interdisciplinary study of sociocultural, linguistic, and contextual influences of education, as well as perspectives from learning, teaching, research and policy. Candidates will examine how issues of power and privilege as they pertain to race, ethnicity, language, class, gender, sexuality and identity politics shape and are shaped within our education system. Candidates will be asked to consider their own schooling experiences, and deeply evaluate their beliefs, thoughts and assumptions about the influence of various legal, historical, socio-cultural and linguistic factors on their ideas about teaching, learning, and schooling. Special attention will be given to the major trends that influence contemporary landscapes of PK-12 education and the potential systemic benefits and harms associated with them. Candidates will produce an autoethnography that considers the impact of personal formal and informal learning experiences rooted in racial, cultural and linguistic identity on their life view, as well as how they move through the world as advocates for justice. This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience.

MS_ED 481-1 is a 0.5-unit course.

Have you been in classes or social situations where you don’t quite understand what people are talking about when it comes to schools and the American dream? Were you educated in a non-US school system? This course will explore the foundation and unique nuances of US American schools through Zaretta Hammond’s five suppositions of culturally responsive teaching. Students will build upon their educational backgrounds and experiences to make meaningful connections with what it means to successfully traverse education in the United States.

Only one of 481-1 and 481-2 is required. 

MS_ED 481-2 is a 0.5-unit course.

Have you been in classes or social situations where you don’t quite understand what people are talking about when it comes to schools and the American dream? Were you educated in a non-US school system? This course will explore the foundation and unique nuances of US American schools through Zaretta Hammond’s five suppositions of culturally responsive teaching. Students will build upon their educational backgrounds and experiences to make meaningful connections with what it means to successfully traverse education in the United States.

Only one of 481-1 and 481-2 is required.

This course will offer a critical perspective on child and adolescent development as it is shaped and experienced in various social contexts with special application to the world of the school. Psychological, interpersonal, social, cognitive, moral, and physical development will be studied within the contexts of family, peer group, and school. Theoretical perspectives will be explored in relation to empirical research, field studies, first person accounts, and imaginative works. Special emphasis will be given to the individual's subjective experience and to the remembered accounts of our own childhood and adolescence.

In this course we explore multiple major theories of typical cognitive and affective development, and their concomitant approaches to understanding and managing neurodiversity in the inclusive classroom. The focus is on integrating across theoretical frameworks in order to maximize classroom support and minimize the need for individual differentiation for students struggling with physical, academic or emotional challenges, including learning disabilities, emotional disturbance, attention deficit disorder, and autism spectrum disorder. Theoretical concepts are introduced in both readings and lecture. Teamwork exercises designed to promote research and theory-based practice provide students with opportunities to analyze increasingly complex case studies, while developing skills in educational leadership, collegial collaboration and student advocacy.

In order to be considered graduate-level, a course must appear in the graduate course catalog. All 400-level courses are graduate-level. Many, but not all, 300-level courses can be considered graduate-level.

The Foundations of Learning in a New Language course engages pre-service teacher candidates in exploring historical, political, sociocultural, philosophical and educational practices that impact linguistically and culturally diverse learners in American schools. Topics include historical and current federal and state laws regarding the learning of English as a new language, foundations of first and second language acquisition, child development, sociocultural theory, and comparative international language instruction. Research and evidence based instructional models are discussed, with a deepened appreciation for factors contributing to sustained student achievement, including, but not limited to the psychological, cognitive, sociological, and cultural factors that impact student learning. An emphasis is placed on the standards for initial Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) Pre-K-12 Teacher Preparation Programs and the WIDA Language Development Standards.

This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience.

The Linguistics Informed Approaches to Literacy course supports students in analyzing the aims of linguistic science as well as how linguistic concepts apply to teaching in a variety of settings (including with multilingual students, monolingual students, and bilingual classrooms). Students will think about the complexities of language and how they connect with identity, culture, power, and schooling. Students explore topics like syntax, phonology, morphology, semantics, and cognates as they develop their own metalinguistic awareness in support of facilitating effective teaching and learning. A focal area will be supporting the development of students’ literacies. Content-area reading topics include but are not limited to pre-reading, post-reading, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension.

This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience.

In order to be considered graduate-level, a course must appear in the graduate course catalog. All 400-level courses are graduate-level. Many, but not all, 300-level courses can be considered graduate-level.

The Designing for Culturally and Linguistically Sustaining Teaching course engages pre-service candidates in developing equitable and sustaining planning and instructional techniques reflective of the lives, languages, literacies, and cultural ways of being that represent the children they will teach. Through exploring diverse heterogeneous instructional practices, this course delves into understanding strategies and ways of thinking about content that transform the daily instructional experiences we can offer our students, making connections a reality.

The tools and strategies utilized in planning for culturally and linguistically sustaining instruction begin with understanding the core work of developing mini-lessons, daily lesson plans, and a unit plan. As a basis for this work, we will work to understand our students from an asset-based stance where learning about their knowledges, experiences, and hopes for an engaging learning environment become foundational in planning, instruction, and assessment. We will do this through intentional practices that examine an understanding of content area literacies and ways to leverage the assets of a diverse, multilingual classroom community inclusive of cultures represented in communities, including literature, art, music, and popular culture of those communities. Exploring how to support students in developing these literacies will also be core to this work.

This course can be applied towards endorsements in English as a Second Language and Bilingual Education on a Professional Educator License and carries 15 clinical clock hours of experience.

This course takes a closer look at the two most important areas of curriculum and instruction: Instructional Design and Assessment. In the first half of the course, students will gain an overview of various approaches to curriculum design and instructional models, including the history and theory of each approach and opportunities to practice them through lesson/unit planning, simulations, and micro-teaching. In the second half of the course, students will investigate several kinds of assessments, including formative and summative assessments, and how those assessments are closely linked to instructional design, teaching, and learning. Opportunities will be given to practice grading, providing good feedback, and managing a class assessment system.

Teaching and Learning with Technology is a course designed to help teachers use empirical models to explore new technologies, evaluate their educational potential, and develop scenarios of use consistent with their teaching philosophy. The course starts with a reflection on the relationship between teaching philosophy and technology use. We will also explore children's everyday uses of technology. We then will take an in-depth look at three emerging technologies: personal broadcasting (e.g., blogs, podcasts), Wikipedia, and gaming. In each case, you will get extensive experience with the technology, examine empirical models that can be applied to the technologies, and reflect on how the technologies intersect with your teaching philosophy. The course also provides exposure to a variety of technologies that are common in school settings.

This course will explore the use of tangible interaction to create innovative learning experiences. It will review both theoretical and technological foundations of the field. Topics include creative expression, embodied interaction, cultural forms, and design frameworks.

Building the skills and knowledge necessary to support the design of educational experiences. Exploration of general design principles and learning sciences theoretical perspectives through examination of existing cases of instructional design. A design project involving needs analysis, specifying learning objectives, and designing a new educational experience.

Issues in designing and studying innovative learning environments. New models of classroom interaction, particularly using technology to enable new cognitive and social roles for students. Topics include simulations, tutors, computer-mediated communication, project-based learning. Theoretical motivations in cognitive and social-interaction learning theories, empirical studies evaluating their effectiveness, and prospects for propagation of such innovations.

Concepts and methods for understanding and studying cognition and learning and putting these concepts and methods to use in a design/change project.

In order to be considered graduate-level, a course must appear in the graduate course catalog. All 400-level courses are graduate-level. Many, but not all, 300-level courses can be considered graduate-level.

What is unique about the U.S. approach to teaching and learning? Why are schools organized the way they are? What does the day-to-day school experience look like for students, teachers, and families? This course will explore the development of schools in the United States by understanding the ideologies and decisions (pedagogical and political) that have shaped schools over 200 years. We will use Illinois and Chicago as case studies of the development of schools in urban, suburban, and rural communities, with a particular focus on Chicago, where public, charter, private, independent, and home schools all exist side by side. Students will explore their own schooling experience while also researching current school issues. Guest speakers from Chicagoland schools and virtual visits to some of those schools will ground our work in the realities of American education today.

Across the K-12 curriculum, approaches to teaching and learning that focus on student sensemaking and meaningful learning rely on creating a classroom where much of this sensemaking work occurs through talk. Supporting productive classroom discourse is a key element in engaging students in meaningful knowledge-building work. Teachers need tools and strategies to create and support an environment in which students feel welcome and responsible for contributing by sharing their ideas, building on one another’s thinking, and working together to further their learning as a community. This course address how to support discourse in the classroom, including designing discussion-based tasks, supporting students in academic discourse, creating a classroom climate supportive of discussion, questioning strategies and talk moves that facilitate discussion, and assessment in discussion-based tasks. We will examine current approaches to supporting effective classroom discussions drawn from elementary, middle school, and high school classrooms, and across multiple disciplines including math, literacy, history, science, and others. Work in the course will involve discussing articles sharing discourse strategies and analyzing video of classroom interactions to see these approaches in action. Students will have the opportunity to work with the tools and strategies of the course in analyzing a classroom discussion they choose to observe, designing discussion-based lessons for their own teaching context, and to try out these tools in facilitating discussions with their peers.

The objective of this course is for students to understand and explore the dynamic environment of middle schools and young adolescents, and to consider the impact of middle school principals, structures and practices on classroom learning and instruction. Students will examine the unique characteristics of middle school learning and the educational needs of young adolescent learners, and they will compare and contrast a variety of middle school models, including policy statements, visions and reform proposals. Students will share and consider their personal experiences, and those of the entire class, as they investigate the many and varied issues that impact any middle school and its community. Major topics include public policy issues, adolescent development, standards and curriculum, measures of intelligence, learning differences, school structure and culture, instructional relationships and strategies, literacy and reading in the content areas, the development of critical thinking skills, culturally responsive and equitable practices, interdisciplinary instruction, assessment methods, middle school leadership, and technology.

The MS_ED 451 topics number is used for new courses, or courses that are likely to only be offered a few times before changing. If the same Topics class is offered three or more years in a row, it will typically be given its own distinct number and title.

If you wish to pursue an independent study, please review the independent study guidelines discussed in the Policies and Procedures section of this handbook. MS_ED 498 is a 0.5 unit course; MS_ED 499 is a 1.0 unit course. Most independent studies will use the 499 number, but if you wish to propose a lengthier project spread over multiple quarters, you may wish to use the 498 number instead.

In order to be considered graduate-level, a course must appear in the graduate course catalog. All 400-level courses are graduate-level. Many, but not all, 300-level courses can be considered graduate-level.

MS_ED 407-1 & 407-2 are two 0.5-unit courses, to be taken sequentially. 

Teaching and education are complex, intellectual, and iterative endeavors. Skilled educators continually take experiences from the field in the form of observations, curiosities, and challenges to inform structured inquiry—with the purpose of improving conceptual and pedagogical understandings for themselves and their students. MSED 407-1 and 407-2 are grounded in a model of action research. In our view, action research is not distinct from the work of teaching and educating, rather when done well it drives the work of teaching and learning. Data we use in action research is precisely that which we encounter in our educational settings on a daily basis—we are responsible for mining and learning from them. As a result of these courses you will not only have designed and conducted action research— your Master’s Project —but more importantly, you will have a set of stances and tools to embark on a career as an educator scholar who continues to notice various aspects of teaching and learning, ask important questions, and engage in meaningful, guided examinations of practice to evolve learning.   

The goal of MSED 407-1 and 407-2 is to help you become informed educators who are able to turn curiosities and challenges from your settings into potential areas of structured reflection and research. The basis of the course is the model of action research — of studying our own settings around questions we are passionate about, for the purpose of improving our students and colleagues learning as well as our own practice. Action research is not distinct from the work of teaching, rather the data we use in action research is precisely that which we encounter in our educational settings daily. As a result of these courses you will not only have conducted action research— your Master’s Project —more importantly, you will have the tools to embark on a career as an educator scholar who continues to ask important questions and embark on meaningful, systematic examinations of teaching and learning in your selected setting. 

During MSED 407-1, you chose a question that was of personal importance to you. You reviewed relevant literature related to this question, you identified different types of classroom data to investigate this question. During MSED 407-2, we will focus on techniques for analyzing the data that you have collected, revisit the literature surrounding our project, and consider how the work will influence your teaching and learning moving forward. In addition to meeting as a whole class, a central component of the 407-1 and 407-2 course sequence is working in coaching groups.

MS_ED 482-1 is a 0.5-unit course. 

The MSED ProSeminar in Educational Studies and the Learning Sciences serves as a companion to program courses with the goal of helping students to bring together the threads from across their coursework and program experiences. In particular, this course emphasizes and makes explicit key ideas that connect to the MSED Guiding Commitments.

MSED 482-1 will support the understanding and development of mutually beneficial, community-engaged partnerships as students explore and onboard to a practicum site.  A professional and career development component will focus on self-assessment, career exploration, and connecting to Northwestern resources that will support this work.

MS_ED 482-2 is a 0.5-unit course.

MSED 482-2 is designed to support the connection between the practicum site and initial development of the Master’s Project. The course will help students understand how to work with, and support, their practicum sites, while developing their research question, engaging important site-specific protocols that govern research, and identifying appropriate sources of data that are available to investigate the research question. A professional and career development component will focus on deepening understanding of possible career paths, building professional networks, and connecting to Northwestern resources that will support this work.