Courses Taught: Undergraduate, Masters, & Doctoral Levels

Teaching Reading (Undergraduate)
This course introduces undergraduates to theories and research in reading development, alongside methods of everyday practice of reading instruction in elementary school classrooms. Through readings, discussion, lesson planning, and interactions with pre-practicum experiences, the goal is to develop an in-depth understanding of how reading develops cognitively and emotionally in children, and to also come to appreciate both the science and the art of excellent reading instruction.

Teaching Language Arts (Undergraduate)
This course is designed to introduce pre-service teachers to language arts instruction, specifically with respect to the oral language and writing development of children in the elementary school grades.  Given the demographic realities of American education, special emphasis is placed on the cultural, ethnic, and linguistic diversity of children in school learning contexts. This course provides an overview of teaching language arts, while simultaneously presenting a means by which new teachers can begin to make sense of the impressive student diversity that characterizes American education in the 21st Century.

Teaching Bilingual Students - Secondary (Masters)
This course, for secondary teachers, is designed to promote awareness and understanding of the teaching of bilingual learners in the content area. In addition to targeting teaching and learning, this course also focuses on specific social, linguistic, and psychological contexts of education as they pertain to secondary teaching in US schools. The primary areas of inquiry for the class are:
Context  Bilingual youth, families, and communities in the context of immigration and U.S. society, and the intersections with teaching and learning. State curriculum frameworks and assessment systems, and relationships with teaching and learning.
Language & Literacy Language and literacy development, academic language, second language acquisition, and bilingualism.
Methods Sheltering and immersion methods of teaching that support reading and writing development for bilingual learners across a variety of settings and content areas.
Approaches  Principles and typologies of immersion education and assessment, and their interactions with teaching and learning across content areas.
Policy Local, regional, and national political contexts of instruction for bilingual learners

Bilingualism, Second Language, and Literacy Development (Advanced Graduate)
The goal of the course is for students to study the cognitive, psychological, and social factors implicated in bilingualism and second language learning, which sets the stage for applications to instruction. The course covers topics ranging from code-switching (how bilinguals use two languages in conversation with one another) to language brokering (when children serve as interpreters for their non-English speaking parents), to the elusive nature of cross-linguistic transfer (how proficiency in a first language relates to proficiency in a second). 

Contemporary Issues and Methods in Literacy Research (Advanced Graduate)
This course is designed to introduce and explore literacy research, theory, and methodology, with a specific focus on the
intersections and divergences between developmental and critical literacy research. Developmental theory and research in literacy starts with some basic presumptions about human development broadly, that have their theoretical and methodological origins in white and European contexts, but have expanded their empirical range in the 21st century. Critical literacy theory and research seeks to disrupt white, European traditions and center the experiences and voices of colonized and marginalized communities. There is scholarship that seeks to marry these two perspectives, and there is scholarship in both these areas that does not overlap. The goal of the course is to start by building an understanding of these literacy traditions and explore different theories, methodologies, and controversies that have emerged, or are currently emerging in literacy research more broadly. Both critical and developmental perspectives are highly relevant to applied educational contexts, and an understanding of what they are and what they mean is important for 21st century literacy researchers.

Historical and Political Contexts of Curriculum (Doctoral)
The goals of this course are straightforward: 

1. Explore notions of curriculum as they pertain to the multiple social, cultural, and political contexts in which curriculum is being developed, enacted, or experienced; 
2. Continue to engage in the process of writing for multiple genres, purposes, and audience; and 
3. Extend your experiences from EDUC9709 so that you begin to develop a longitudinal perspective on your own research interests and professional objectives 

Curriculum is ubiquitous in education, and it varies tremendously in terms of how it is defined, where it is enacted, and who experiences it. Per Goal #1, curriculum cannot be understood independent of its social, cultural, and political contexts. In addition, curriculum will never be education’s salvation. The most expertly developed curriculum, in the hands of an ill-equipped, or even nefarious educator, is a bad curriculum. Conversely, a poorly-designed curriculum, in the hands of an expert and caring educator, can become a vehicle for thoughtful instruction and meaningful learning. 

Dissertation Seminar (Doctoral)
The two goals of Dissertation Seminar are for students to establish an understanding of what constitutes a dissertation, and to explore different routes and methodological approaches that lead to successful dissertations. More specifically, students work to establish an understanding of what will constitute their specific dissertations, and to identify the methodological approaches they wish to employ. To these ends, students engage with their peers to think about and construct ideas to inform the dissertation, and by extension the next stage of students' doctoral careers as official dissertators. This course serves as the second cohort class for first-year doctoral students, and is meant to function in relation to EDUC9709, which was taken in the Fall of your first year.