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CURRICULAR UNIT - METHODS AND TECHNIQUES FOR RESEARCH IN EDUCATION I

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
1st Year – 1st Semester 
Código UC nº 6914201

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

The curricular  Unit aims to

The objectives of the course unit ate to:

• 1. develop students’ competencies for understanding, and critical analysis and evaluation of scientific production in the area of education in general, and pre-school education in particular, with a special emphasis on quantitative approaches.
• 2. Provide theoretical and methodological knowledge required for the development of a quantitative research project.
• 3. promote the interest in the adopting of an investigative stance to practice as a means of reflective practice and continuous professional development.

By the end of the course unit students will be able to:

• I. understand the main theoretical and methodological principles underlying the quantitative paradigm of research,
• ii. articulate the theoretical and practical concepts in the selection of quantitative methods of data collection and analysis appropriate to different contexts;
• iii. critically evaluate research studies of a quantitative nature.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

1. Education - a field for scientific research

• 1.1. Main features of the scientific method
• 1.2. Research paradigms: quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods

2. Main types of quantitative research

• 2.1. Descriptive and exploratory studies
• 2.2. Experimental and pre-experimental research
• 2.3. Survey

3. Reading for research

• 3.1. Searcingh for and selection relevant literature
• 3.2. Literature review; techniques of documentary research

4. Stages and dimensions of quantitative research

• 4.1. Problematic, definition of objectives and formulation of questions/hypotheses
• 4.2. Definition of variables
• 4.3. Collection of quantitative data: questionnaire; observation grids
• 4.4. Analysis and presentation of quantitative data: descriptive and correlational statistics
• 4.5. Validity and reliability
• 4.6. Ethical aspects of quantitative research

5. Academic style of writing

• 5.1. General rules of academic writing
• 5.2. Structure of the research report.

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CURRICULAR UNIT - EXPRESSIVE PRACTICES IN CHILDHOOD

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
1st Year – 1st Semester 
Código UC nº 6914203

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

 

• - To understand the importance of the education for the arts and expression, challenging students to conceptualize the current challenges in this domain and to explore different potentialities of work in this area.
• - To recognize the contribution of imagination and creativity for a more harmonious profile in terms of child learning and development.
• - Knowing and analyzing the curricular goals of Artistic Expressions in Preschool.
• - Understanding the contribution of the arts in the formation of human being.
• - Knowing the fundamental conceptual tools for the teaching of each of the areas of artistic expression.
• - Demonstrate the ability to design activities / projects of Artistic Expression in an integrated way.
• - Demonstrate the ability to design features tailored to different activities/projects.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

• - Curricular guidelines in early childhood education;
• - Contributions of artistic expressions to the child's development and their relation to other domains of the curriculum;
• - Conceptual tools of artistic languages (movement, drama, visual arts and music skills).
• - Didactic basics of artistic development.
• - Methodologies for planning activities / projects in artistic education (phasing, typology of activities, selection of resources, dynamization strategies and assessment procedures).
• - Integration of artistic expressions strategies with other curricular domains.

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CURRICULAR UNIT - CURRICULAR INTEGRATION AND EVALUATION

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
1st Year – 1st Semester 
Código UC nº 6914204

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

The Course Unit on Curriculum Integration and Evaluation aims to:

• i. provide knowledge of the theoretical foundations of the concept of “curricular integration” and its contributions to globalizing, meaningful and functional learning, as well as the roles of different actors in a teaching-learning process based on curricular integration;
• ii. provide knowledge of the evolution of the concept and practices of evaluation in duration and the different functions and purposes that the evaluation can assume.

By the end of this Course Unit students are expected to demonstrate competences of comprehension, analysis, implementation and critical reflection on processes, devices and strategies in order to:

• i. design integrated curriculum projects and plan integrated teaching-learning activities.
• ii. distinguish the positivist / psychometric evaluation from the constructivist evaluation and make informed use of the different modalities of the evaluation according to its purposes and functions;
• iii. integrate evaluation in daily practice as a guiding element of the teaching-learning process.
• iv. desing, organize and implement a diversity of strategies and instruments for the evaluation of pedagogical practice and reorganize teaching and learning in view of the results in the evaluation records.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

1. Curricular Integration

• 1.1. Fundamentals of curricular integration: epistemological and disciplinary, psychopedagogical and socio-cultural;
• 1.2. Dimensions of curriculum integration: the school, content areas, actors (learners, teachers and family).

2. Integrated Curricular Projects (ICP)

• 2.1. Objectives and characteristics of an ICP.
• 2.2. Research-based teaching and learning and the methodology of the project work.
• 2.3. Integral activities: criteria, planning and registration.
• 2.4. The roles of the Educator, the family and other educational actors in the construction of an ICP.

3. Brief historical overview of evaluation in education

• 3.1. Evolution of thought on evaluation over four generations of evaluation;
• 3.2. Legal framework of evaluation in the Portuguese educational system: legal provisions on the evaluation of learning in Pre-school Education and in the 1st cycle of Basic Education.

4. Conceptualization of evaluation of teaching and learning

• 4.1. Functions of evaluation: diagnostic, formative and summative; continuous and terminal; formal and informal; process and product; criterial and normative.
• 4.2. Domains of evaluation: affective, social, cognitive and metacognitive
• 4.3. Self-evaluation. The reflective as a reflective professional

5. Operationalization of evaluation of teaching and learning

• 5.1. Techniques  and instruments for diagnostic, formative and summative evaluation
• 5.2. Validity and reliability of assessment tools
• 5.3. Diversification of assessment practices as a central instrument of a differentiated pedagogy and inclusive.

6. Project evaluation: stages, processes and practices.

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CURRICULAR UNIT - METHODS AND TECHNIQUES FOR RESEARCH IN EDUCATION II

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
1st Year – 2nd Semester 
Código UC nº 6914206

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

 

The main objectives of the course unit are to:

• 1. Develop competencies of identification, critical analysis and evaluation of empirical research of a qualitative nature.
• 2. Provide theoretical and methodological knowledge required for the development of a qualitative research project.
• 3. Promote the interest in the adopting of an investigative stance to practice as a means of reflective practice and continuing professional development.

By the end of the course unit students will be able to:

• i. Understand the main theoretical and methodological aspects underlying the qualitative paradigm of educational research.
• ii. Articulate the theoretical and practical concepts in the selection of qualitative methodologies appropriate to different contexts.
• iii. Critically evaluate research studies of a qualitative nature.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

1. Fundamentals of qualitative research

• 1.1. Theoretical and epistemological principles;
• 1.2. Main types of qualitative studies: phenomenological, ethnographic, and case study;

2. The qualitative research process:

• 2.1. Focusing the research: formulation of questions and research plan;
• 2.2. Study design and sampling in qualitative research;
• 2.3. Qualitative methods of data collection: direct observation; interviews; diaries, and life stories;
• 2.4. Analysis and presentation of qualitative data: content analysis – constant comparative method; thematic analysis; grounded theory.

3. Ethical issues in qualitative research.

4. Criteria of quality in qualitative research - trustworthiness; credibility, transferability, dependability, confirmability (Guba & Lincoln, 1994).

5. Dissemination of qualitative research

• 5.1. General rules of academic writing;
• 5.2. Structure of the research report.

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CURRICULAR UNIT - DISCOVERING MATHEMATICS IN PRESCHOOL EDUCATION

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
1st Year – 2nd Semester 
Código UC nº 

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

• 1. To know the history of the game to the present day;
• 2. To know the mathematical contents studied in preschool education;
• 3. To know how these contents are developed in Portugal and other countries;
• 4. To analyze pedagogical and methodological aspects particularly adequate to children who are attending preschool education;
• 5. To know, analyze and select didactical materials adequate and related with the mathematical contents;
• 6. To provide tools that facilitate a critical and reflexive intervention in the education domain and in the learning and teaching processes;
• 7. To develop reading habits, searching competencies and autonomy as a contribution to the personal and professional development of future teachers and other educational agents;
• 8. To develop in students an epistemological and social conscience that sustains personal and professional ways of acting.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

• 1. Properties and criteria
• 2. Numbers
• 3. Shape
• 4. Space
• 5. Patterns
• 6. Measure and the concept of unity
• 7. Partitions, adition, subtractions
• 8. Materials.

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CURRICULAR UNIT - WORLD KNOWLEDGE IN PRESCHOOL EDUCATION

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
1st Year – 2nd Semester 
Código UC nº 6914208

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

• - To elaborate didactic proposals about Science, technology, society and environment (STSE) education and recognize the significance of attitudes that promote the sustainability.
• - Know the scientific methodology and promote scientific thinking and experimentation, and to reflect critically on the activities, recognizing the potential and limits of its implementation.
• - Reflect about the adequacy of space and material to work with children in "the science area".
• - To promote the interest and respect for the natural, social and cultural environment through appropriate teaching projects.
• - To acquire skills to critically analyse the preschool materials and learnt how to adapt the curriculum proposals to the context they should be applied.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

1. The teaching of science and the contribution of geographic content to the knowledge of the world in Preschool Education: 

• 1.1. Context and skills development 
• 1.2. The performance of kindergarten teacher. The importance of the ideas of children. 

2. The dimension of time and space and the study developed. Methodological approach and knowledge - terminology and conceptual development 

3. The integration of the environment as the reference and identity in different scales.

4. Development of science education

• 4.1. Scientific processes;
• 4.2. Importance of attitudes in science education and their contribution in the individual and social education of children. 

5. Practical work in science education. Participation of children and playful nature of the activities

• 5.1. The activities and the teaching methods about a natural environment
• 5.2.  The science area:  organization material and safety
• 5.3. Investigation projects in preschool education

6. Didactics resources: inventory, construction, exploration, diversity and innovation in teaching practices.

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CURRICULAR UNIT - SPECIAL EDUCATIONAL NEEDS

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
2nd Year – 1st Semester 
Código UC nº 6914209

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

• - To know the planning for an pedagogical intervention that addresses the students’ diversity and in according to their educational needs;
• -  To understand the organization of activities with different levels of complexity, in order to allow the students to fit in one of the complexity levels;
• - To know the Portuguese legislative framework that regulates the education for children with special educational needs;
• - To know the diversity and the fundamental characteristics of different types of SEN;
• - To develop specific skills of planning for a pedagogical intervention that addresses the diversity of students with SEN;
• - To use the assessment moments as a regulatory and developer element of the teaching / learning process;
• - To Understand the importance of continuous training and research in the development of teaching and learning process, particularly in the area of special educational needs.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

I - SEN, Inclusive School and Pedagogical Differentiation

• 1.  Students with special educational needs and pedagogical differentiation
• 2. Curriculum, Curriculum Flexibility and Pedagogical Differentiation
• 3. Differentiated Pedagogy as extra value to development of competencies
• 4. Purposeful Education
• 5. Differentiated Learning Experiences
• 6. Special Educational Needs: typologies and diversity in the human development

- Concepts and characteristics about the spectrum of the special educational needs

• 7. Principles and dilemmas for the creation of an inclusive school.

II - Special Education: Practices and Legislation

• 1. Portuguese legal framework – Changes and Flexibility

Decree-Law Nº 319/1991

Decree-Law Nº 3/2008

Decree-Law Nº 54/2018.

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CURRICULAR UNIT - PROFESSIONAL ETHICS AND DEONTOLOGY

Academic Year: 2020 / 2021
2nd Year – 1st Semester 
Código UC nº 6914210

OBJECTIVES AND COMPETENCES TO BE DEVELOPED    

Ethics and Deontology has the following objectives:

• 1. Acquire a comprehensive knowledge on fundamental concepts of Ethics and Deontology, and relevant information on problems of professional ethics teaching and practical aspects that involve.
• 2. To be able to understand and analyze both theories and practices related to teaching.
• 3. Formulate performance criteria on aspects related to professional practice.
• 4. Develop awareness and ethical and civic responsibility, in general and professionally.

PROGRAM CONTENTS

I. GENERAL ETHICS: CONCEPTS AND PRINCIPLES

• 1. Nature and fundamentals of Ethics. Ethical approaches.
• 2. Key notions: human liberty, human actions and responsibility.
• 3. Conscience and its formation.
• 4. Ethical intent and moral norms.

II. ETHICS, PROFESSIONALITY AND DEONTOLOGY

• 5. Articulation between personal ethics and professional ethics.
• 6. Professional Competences and dimensions in this area. Code of ethical conduct for the education of young children.
• 7. Ethics, deontology and Education: Ethical implications of teaching.

7.1. Ethics, values and education.

7.1.2. Education models for values.