General Education Requirements
A minimum of 42 credit hours of general education courses is required for the Elementary Education (Grades 1-6) and Early Childhood Education (Grades PreK-3) double major, B.A. degree with Bridge to the MA in Early Childhood Education.. Some of the courses listed below are required to fulfill the general education requirements and others may be used as electives. Other courses not listed below may also be considered to fulfill electives that comprise the General Education requirements. General Education courses must meet the following criteria:
Humanities - Fine Arts Elective (Music, Art, Performance - 3 hours), Literature Elective - 3 hours, Multi-Cultural Elective - (Study Abroad, Foreign Language, other - 3 hours) = Total 9 hours
Literacy - (ENG 101 Writing I and ENG 104 Writing II required) = Total 6 hours
Mathematics - MATH 207, 116 OR117, AND Math 208 = Total 6 hours
Science - SCI 131 OR 132, AND SCI Elective with Lab or Lab Experience = Minimum Total 6 hours
Social Science - EDUC 220 HIST 121 OR 122, and PSCI 101 = Total 9 hours
Electives -6 hours: EDUC 100 - Introduction to Schooling or its equivalent is required for all freshman education students and strongly recommended as an elective for all other education majors; all freshmen are also required to take INTD 101 - University Seminar. This credit will count toward the 6-hour elective requirement for Elementary Education majors.
Please work with your life coach and faculty mentor to determine which of the listed general education courses are appropriate for you.
Practicum Experiences (28 Hours)
Education majors spend a considerable amount of time in schools gaining firsthand classroom experience with students. Beginning in the sophomore year, all education students are required to complete a practicum experience each semester, with increasingly rigorous expectations regarding student interactions, lesson planning and delivery, and collaboration with professional educators in the field. These experiences build upon one another to provide teacher candidates with exposure to students from multiple grade levels in diverse schools and districts, as well as to a wide variety of teaching/learning opportunities in real-world settings. These practicum experiences culminate in student teaching experience in the final semester if he initial teacher preparation program. Candidates completing a master’s degree in early childhood education take an additional 6 hours of practicum experience in early childhood at the graduate level.