VCSU

SECTION III: ADDRESSING THE STANDARDS

VCSU has provided a list of the primary courses and experiences tagged to each InTASC Standard. The Education Preparation Provider (EPP) included a written narrative description as well as evidence gathered through the use of multiple assessments and a variety of sources to gain perspectives on teacher candidates' performance and levels of confidence in their preparation. The overall efforts engage teacher candidates, faculty, staff, cooperating teachers, administrators, university supervisors, completers, employers from partnering schools and many others. The InTASC Standards and data gathered, analyzed, and shared toward meeting those standards are useful for data-informed decision-making that is focused on continuous improvement.

Standard #1 Learner Development: The program requires an understanding of how learners grow and develop, recognizing that patterns of learning and development vary individually within and across the cognitive, linguistic, social, emotional, and physical areas, and designs and implements developmentally appropriate and challenging learning experiences.

The InTASC standards are tagged to the key assessments utilized by the Education Preparation Provider (EPP). Data tagged to Standard 1 Data are gathered and analyzed from exit surveys, disposition data, student teacher final evaluations, completer surveys, and employer surveys (Evidence 1.1). The data gathered from teacher candidates, cooperating teachers, faculty, completers, and employers indicate teacher candidates are doing well at planning and implementing developmentally appropriate learning experiences. The use of multiple measures provides meaningful data to inform the program about the teacher candidates' preparation related to planning and implementing developmentally appropriate lessons for students.

Teacher candidates complete PSYC 111 Introduction to Psychology to learn fundamentals about human behavior and mental processes. Candidates learn how children grow, develop, and learn in PSYC 250 Developmental Psychology. Teacher candidates are introduced to theories and concepts in a variety of areas of human development (e.g., cognitive, social, emotional, physical) and across the lifespan from prenatal development to advanced ages. Discussions and assignments ask teacher candidates to consider how these areas affect complex aspects of development like forming and maintaining healthy relationships, understanding gender identity and sexual orientation, processing grief, and creating one's self-concept and self-esteem. Teacher candidates learn about development domains and how to apply their understanding of how children grow and develop across the developmental domains. Teacher candidates assess learners' development using a variety of assessments, individually and in group contexts, to determine strengths and needs in each area of development. Teacher candidates continue to learn more about the development of their learners and building positive relationships with their students through EDUC 400 Educational Psychology.

Methods courses provide additional knowledge and the development of skills to address learner readiness, strengths, weaknesses, interests, and motivators of individual students. The content-specific methods courses (Evidence 1.2 Methods Course Descriptions) that complement the professional education sequences are listed below:

Elementary Level (1^st grade through 8^th grade licensure) -EDUC 315 Mathematics in the Elementary School, EDUC 320 Social Studies in the Elementary School, EDUC 322 Methods of Language Arts Instruction, EDUC 323 Methods of Reading in the Elementary School, EDUC 355 Science Methods for Elementary Teachers.

K-12 Level (K-12 licensure) - ART 390 Art Methods, MUS 403 Choral Methods and Literature, MUS 404 Instrumental Methods and Literature, HPER 490 Methods of Teaching K-12 Physical Education

Secondary Level (5^th grade through 12^th grade licensure) - BIOL 490 Secondary Science Methods and Techniques, BUSI 490 Methods and Materials for Teaching Business Subjects, ENGL 490 Methods of Teaching English, HIST 490 Methods of Teaching Social Science, HPER 390 Secondary Health Education Methods, MATH 490 Teaching Secondary School Mathematics, STEM ED 411 STEM Curriculum and Methods.

While the primary InTASC Standards emphasized through the methods courses are most directly related to teaching content and planning for instruction, the methods courses address the needs of learners and learner development. Teacher candidates learn to plan, implement, evaluate, and reflect on lessons for learning that take into consideration individual children's strengths and needs through the professional education sequence and their methods courses.

Teacher candidates put their learning into practice during their student teaching experience and Teaching for Learning Capstone (TLC) Unit (Evidence 1.3 TLC Learner Development Examples). The capstone unit is the EPP's teacher work sample similar to the edTPA. Teacher candidates apply what they have learned about the strengths and needs of their students to plan, implement, assess, and reflect on a unit for learning. Pre-, post, and formative assessments are utilized to consider the growth of the class and the individual students (Evidence 1.4 Teacher Candidate TLC application samples for learners and learning).