EUB172 Professional Experience: Introduction to Early Childhood Practice (Kindergarten)


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Unit Outline: Semester 1 2024, Online

Unit code:EUB172
Credit points:12
Pre-requisite:EUB104
Equivalent:EUB140, EDB120, EDB121
Disclaimer - Offer of some units is subject to viability, and information in these Unit Outlines is subject to change prior to commencement of the teaching period.

Overview

This unit focuses on examining the roles and practices of early childhood teachers in building respectful relationships with children, families, communities, and colleagues. You will learn to observe, document, and assess children's learning as well as plan and implement engaging play-based pedagogies to support and extend children's learning. You will critically reflect on your teaching and the links between the National Quality Standard and the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers.

You will participate in 15 days of professional experience. Learning in this unit will be related to preparing for and reflecting on the time you will spend in a kindergarten.

This is a designated unit which is essential to your course progression. Designated units include professional experience units, units requiring the development of particular skills, and units requiring demonstration of certain personal qualities. If you fail to achieve a satisfactory level of performance in a designated unit, you may be excluded from enrolment or will be put on academic probation. If you fail a designated unit twice within your course, you may be excluded. Supplementary assessment is not available on designated units.

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit you will be able to:

  1. Plan play-based child-centred learning experiences in response to observations of children's play in kindergartens that aligns with the EYLF or QKLG.
  2. Critically reflect on current issues in early childhood education in relation to academic and professional literature.
  3. Communicate effectively and professionally with children aged 3-5 years, their families and with colleagues.
  4. Conduct yourself ethically and professionally in line with the code of ethics for teachers and codes of conduct.
  5. Seek and apply constructive feedback from supervisors, teachers and peers to improve teaching practices.
  6. Demonstrate planning, teaching, management of safe and supportive learning environments, assessing and recording learning, and professional conduct during professional experience.

Content

This unit will cover the following:

  • The expectations for professional experience placements, including professional preparation, engagement and reflection;
  • Curriculum decision-making based on documents such as the Early Years Learning Framework and National Quality Standard to inform professional practice with children aged 3-5 years;
  • Contemporary theories, curriculum approaches, and a range of teaching strategies for children aged 3-5 years;
  • The multiple ways that children aged 3-5 years learn by observing, documenting and assessing children's individual and group learning;
  • Play-based pedagogies to engage children's interests, inquiry and learning;
  • Ways to create positive indoor and outdoor environments for children aged 3-5 years;
  • A range of teaching strategies, including verbal and non-verbal communication strategies to support child engagement, and practical approaches to managing and responding to challenging behaviour;
  • Ethical and professional practices for creating secure and respectful professional relationships with children, families, colleagues and communities;
  • Transitions and continuity of learning for children aged 3-5 years;
  • The role of teaching and being a teacher, and a range of teaching strategies;
  • Strategies for reflecting on and evaluating teaching to improve student learning: observation of children, planning child-centred, play-based learning experiences, implementing, reflecting and evaluating these experiences; and
  • Designing learning experiences with clear learning intentions (goals) and success criteria that provide achievable challenges for students of varying abilities and characteristics.

 

Learning Approaches

Professional experience units explicitly teach and practise course content prior to the commencement of placement. The varied length of placements is dependent on the course requirements. QUT teaching staff ensures each professional experience unit accommodates the teaching and practising of content with regard to the timing of placements as outlined on the Professional Experience, the QUT Semester calendars, and the unit overview.

A range of teaching and learning strategies including:

  • lectures
  • workshops
  • online materials
  • participation in large-group discussions, and
  • small group interactions will be utilised.

Your learning will be enhanced by professional readings and recordings. 

Professional experience will involve 15 days of supervised teaching practice, formal observations and integration with kindergartens.

Feedback on Learning and Assessment

Feedback in this unit is provided to you in the following ways:

  • professional experience reports (interim and final)
  • comments and feedback from your University Partner and Supervising Teacher
  • feedback from peers during group discussions
  • unit coordinator and tutor comments to the cohort
  • formative assessment task - early in the teaching period you will complete a class activity outlining your initial planning for Assessment Task 2. You will be provided with the opportunity to engage in a feedback process with peers and academic staff.

Assessment

Overview

There are two assessment tasks in this unit:

1. Professional Experience Report - This will require you to connect the learning from this unit and your course about curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment to professional experience.

2. Professional Plan - This will require you to draw on your understanding of early childhood pedagogy to create a learning experience plan and critically reflect on an issue in early childhood education.

You must receive a passing grade (Satisfactory) on each assessment task to successfully pass this unit. Since this is a Professional Experience unit, special conditions of assessment apply to the second assessment task in the unit— Professional Plans (annotated). Assessment criteria for Assessment Task 2 number five. You must pass all five assessment criteria to pass the second assessment task. Where an attempt fails to meet any one (1) assessment criterion, a resubmission of the assessment task within 72 hours of the release of results for that task may be permitted. It is your responsibility as a student to (i) resubmit your complete assignment should your unsatisfactory attempt fall within this margin of insufficiency (i.e., of one criterion) and (ii) notify your Unit Coordinator via email of your submission. 

Unit Grading Scheme

S (Satisfactory) / U (Unsatisfactory)

Assessment Tasks

Assessment: Professional Experience Report

You will practise your skills related to the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers in preparation for meeting the requirements of the final report.

Please refer to your course information. Non-compliance with course requirements relating to professional experience may prevent you from undertaking your professional experience placement.

Threshold Assessment:

You must achieve a passing grade (satisfactory) on each individual assessment task to successfully pass this unit.

Weight: 0
Length: 15 days professional experience
Individual/Group: Individual
Due (indicative): Last day of placement
Related Unit learning outcomes: 3, 4, 5, 6

Assessment: Professional Plans (annotated)

You will observe and analyse kindergarten children at play, and create an annotated learning experience plan. You will also critically reflect on an issue in early childhood education.

This assignment is eligible for the 48-hour late submission period and assignment extensions.

Threshold Assessment:

You must achieve a passing grade (satisfactory) on each individual assessment task to successfully pass this unit. Resubmission of Assessment Task 2 may be permitted. See 'Assessment Overview' above.

Weight: 0
Length: 2000 words
Individual/Group: Individual
Due (indicative): Week 7
Related Unit learning outcomes: 1, 2

Academic Integrity

Students are expected to engage in learning and assessment at QUT with honesty, transparency and fairness. Maintaining academic integrity means upholding these principles and demonstrating valuable professional capabilities based on ethical foundations.

Failure to maintain academic integrity can take many forms. It includes cheating in examinations, plagiarism, self-plagiarism, collusion, and submitting an assessment item completed by another person (e.g. contract cheating). It can also include providing your assessment to another entity, such as to a person or website.

You are encouraged to make use of QUT’s learning support services, resources and tools to assure the academic integrity of your assessment. This includes the use of text matching software that may be available to assist with self-assessing your academic integrity as part of the assessment submission process.

Further details of QUT’s approach to academic integrity are outlined in the Academic integrity policy and the Student Code of Conduct. Breaching QUT’s Academic integrity policy is regarded as student misconduct and can lead to the imposition of penalties ranging from a grade reduction to exclusion from QUT.

Requirements to Study

Requirements

Meet, and show evidence of, the public health or employment vaccination mandates/requirements of your state jurisdiction. 

Blue Card

A blue card is required to complete this unit. A blue card confirms that you have passed a screening of your criminal history (the Working with Children Check) and have been approved to work with children and young people. For more information on the blue card and how to apply please visit the QUT website.

Costs

There may be costs related to immunisations. 

Risk Assessment Statement

There are no out-of-the-ordinary risks associated with the general conduct of this unit. Workplace health and safety protocols in relation to computer use will apply.

Managing the risk associated with your professional experience is bound in an agreement with the systemic employment bodies and individual sites where necessary. The Workplace Health and Safety Act 2011 (Qld) places duties of care on everyone to ensure the health and safety of themselves and others in the workplace.

Students should be aware of and comply with the QUT work integrated learning policy under QUT's Assessment Policy is at MOPP C/4.4.

Standards/Competencies

This unit is designed to support your development of the following standards\competencies.

Australian Professional Standards for Teachers

1 Professional Knowledge: Know students and how they learn

  1. Physical, social and intellectual development and characteristics of students
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  2. Understand how students learn
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  3. Students with diverse linguistic, cultural, religious and socioeconomic backgrounds
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  4. Differentiate teaching to meet the specific learning needs of students across the full range of abilities
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)

2 Professional Knowledge: Know the content and how to teach it

  1. Content and teaching strategies of the teaching area
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  2. Content selection and organisation
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  3. Curriculum, assessment and reporting
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)

3 Professional Practice: Plan for and implement effective teaching and learning

  1. Establish challenging learning goals
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  2. Plan, structure and sequence learning programs
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  3. Use teaching strategies
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  4. Select and use resources
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report
  5. Use effective classroom communication
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report
  6. Evaluate and improve teaching programs
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  7. Engage parents/carers in the educative process
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report

4 Professional Practice: Create and maintain supportive and safe learning environments

  1. Support student participation
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  2. Manage classroom activities
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  3. Maintain student safety
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report

5 Professional Practice: Assess, provide feedback and report on student learning

  1. Assess student learning
    Relates to: Professional Plans (annotated)
  2. Interpret student data
    Relates to: Professional Plans (annotated)

6 Professional Engagement: Engage in professional learning

  1. Engage with colleagues and improve practice
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report

7 Professional Engagement: Engage professionally with colleagues, parents/carers and the community

  1. Meet professional ethics and responsibilities
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report
  2. Comply with legislative, administrative and organisational requirements
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report
  3. Engage with the parents/carers
    Relates to: Professional Experience Report

Course Learning Outcomes

This unit is designed to support your development of the following course/study area learning outcomes.

ED39 Bachelor of Education (Early Childhood)

  1. Knowledgeable: Apply professional knowledge to learning areas, learning and learners.
    Relates to: ULO1, ULO6, Professional Experience Report, Professional Plans (annotated)
  2. Scholarly: Consider the ways in which educational theory and research inform and impact teaching practice.
    Relates to: ULO2, Professional Plans (annotated)
  3. Inclusive: Plan for culturally secure, supportive, caring, inclusive and positive learning environments.
    Relates to: ULO6, Professional Experience Report
  4. Responsive: Interpret data, policy and legislative requirements to inform professional decisions about practice.
    Relates to: ULO6, Professional Experience Report
  5. Collegial: Collaborate and connect with professional networks and the wider community.
    Relates to: ULO3, ULO5, ULO6, Professional Experience Report
  6. Reflective: Reframe challenges into opportunities for capacity building and learning.
    Relates to: ULO6, Professional Experience Report
  7. Ethical: Engage ethically and respectfully with learners, colleagues, parents/carers and community from diverse backgrounds.
    Relates to: ULO3, ULO4, ULO6, Professional Experience Report
  8. Communicative: Engage and communicate effectively and professionally.
    Relates to: ULO3, ULO6, Professional Experience Report