Singapore University of Social Sciences

Building on ECE525 Investigating Curricular Content and Constructivist Pedagogies and ADL598 Learning Design Project, ECE599 Independent Curriculum Project offers students the opportunity to integrate their early childhood education (ECE) learning by designing a short line of inquiry into an ECE curricular and/or pedagogical topic of their choice. Students will have the opportunity to make this small-scale independent study relevant and meaningful to their daily work, and potentially contribute to the education of teachers and/or parents. Students will be supervised individually for this project. In order to complete the project, students will be required to apply their knowledge of andragogy and strategies for catering to diverse adult learning needs (e.g., novice and experienced teachers, parents). This course will have group seminars to serve as provocations for students’ thinking, including sessions with guest speakers discussing contemporary issues of curriculum and pedagogical leadership and/or educational dilemmas; and the course will draw on the Socratic method and design thinking principles to facilitate the students’ individual processes of inquiry. Students will need to identify their interests (i.e., specific questions, problems) in ECE curriculum and instruction, conduct a literature/resource review to inform their line of inquiry and the desired outcome of this independent study (i.e., what they hope to achieve or create). The scope of this independent study could include (but not be limited to) the following: designing a workshop or course on an identified topic of learning need; evaluating a set of educators’ resources; designing, implementing and reflecting on the usefulness of a set of teacher coaching resources.