In Progress
Please note that this Unit Profile is still in progress. The content below is subject to change.Overview
Young children make and communicate meaning about their world in multiple ways, particularly through their engagement with the arts (visual arts, dance, drama, music, storytelling, media) and technology. Building from your developing knowledge of curriculum frameworks pertaining to The Arts and Technology and the general capabilities, you will research contemporary meaning making processes available to young children and explain how teachers support such meaning making in early childhood learning environments as they engage in curriculum decision making. Through the careful design of learning spaces, including natural spaces, you will demonstrate your understanding of children’s development, strengths, needs and interests and also ensure that all children can participate. Reflecting on early childhood pedagogies, you will identify potential issues with ICT use and propose strategies to support the safe, responsible and ethical use of ICT in learning and teaching. You will gain personal and practical experience in using the different symbol systems and ways of understanding and representing and making meaning of the world. The unit will equip you with dispositions for valuing the use of The Arts and Technologies for effective teaching and learning and with a working knowledge of some fundamental tools that can be applied across curriculum learning areas in early childhood contexts.
Details
Pre-requisites or Co-requisites
There are no requisites for this unit.
Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework).
Offerings For Term 1 - 2025
Attendance Requirements
All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).
Recommended Student Time Commitment
Each 6-credit Postgraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.
Class Timetable
Assessment Overview
Assessment Grading
This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of 'pass' in order to pass the unit. If any 'pass/fail' tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully ('pass' grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the 'assessment task' section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%). Consult the University's Grades and Results Policy for more details of interim results and final grades.
All University policies are available on the CQUniversity Policy site.
You may wish to view these policies:
- Grades and Results Policy
- Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework)
- Review of Grade Procedure
- Student Academic Integrity Policy and Procedure
- Monitoring Academic Progress (MAP) Policy and Procedure - Domestic Students
- Monitoring Academic Progress (MAP) Policy and Procedure - International Students
- Student Refund and Credit Balance Policy and Procedure
- Student Feedback - Compliments and Complaints Policy and Procedure
- Information and Communications Technology Acceptable Use Policy and Procedure
This list is not an exhaustive list of all University policies. The full list of University policies are available on the CQUniversity Policy site.
Feedback, Recommendations and Responses
Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.
Feedback from Student feedback
A lot of content to be covered and while some of the activities were useful sometimes the amount was quite overwhelming.
Reflect on the relevance of activities to assessment and essential learning.
Feedback from Student feedback
A really valuable and enjoyable unit with lots of resources for my future teaching career.
Keep revising the unit as needed for best practice and continued relevance.
Feedback from Personal reflection
Many students did not attend tutorials, despite offering these after school hours as previously requested.
Consider offering split or alternating times for tutorials to enable all to attend at least half.
- Research meaning making processes that children use to communicate about the world and explicate pedagogical implications for teachers
- Analyse curriculum documents to identify the guidance provided in relation to pedagogy and also to identify the implications for your ongoing learning about the meaning making process
- Design provocation spaces that invite children’s engagement and provide opportunities for them to respond in multiple ways and enable inclusive student participation and engagement
- Articulate how knowledge and understanding of children’s development, strengths, needs and interests are reflected in design spaces and the possibilities for learning afforded to children
- Synthesise how the web of possibilities, including pedagogical choices, contribute to addressing the general capabilities in the Australian Curriculum and the learning outcomes in the Early Years Learning Framework particularly in relation to literacy and numeracy and ICTs
- Critically reflect on potential issues in relation to the safe, responsible and ethical use of ICT to support the learning and teaching of young children.
Learning outcomes and assessment in this unit provide opportunities for students to engage with content and practices in the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers (Graduate Stage) focus areas of:
1.1 Physical, social and
intellectual development and characteristics of students
1.2 Understand how students learn
1.6 Strategies to support full participation of students with disability
2.1 Content and teaching strategies of the teaching area
2.5 Literacy and numeracy strategies
2.6 Information and Communication Technology (ICT)
3.1 Establish challenging learning goals
3.3 Use teaching strategies
4.1 Support student participation
4.5 Use ICT safely, responsibly and ethically
6.2 Engage
in professional learning and improve practice
6.4 Apply professional learning and improve student learning
Alignment of Assessment Tasks to Learning Outcomes
| Assessment Tasks | Learning Outcomes | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| 1 - Written Assessment - 40% | ||||||
| 2 - Written Assessment - 60% | ||||||
Alignment of Graduate Attributes to Learning Outcomes
| Graduate Attributes | Learning Outcomes | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| 1 - Knowledge | ||||||
| 2 - Communication | ||||||
| 3 - Cognitive, technical and creative skills | ||||||
| 4 - Research | ||||||
| 5 - Self-management | ||||||
| 6 - Ethical and Professional Responsibility | ||||||
| 7 - Leadership | ||||||
| 8 - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultures | ||||||