EDM5001 Understanding Learners and Learning

Requisites

Pre-requisite: EDM5000 and Students must be enrolled in the MOLT

Other requisites

Students must have successfully completed the entire previous year’s Professional Experience courses in order to enrol in this course. Students must be available for a prescribed period of time to undertake a placement in a school or other approved site as required in this course.

Before commencing this course students will be assumed to have read the full details of Professional Experience particulars and familiarised themselves with the requirements. Please see the Education Placement Professional Experience website https://www.usq.edu.au/current-students/assessment/professional-experience and the Professional Experience Book for full details.

State law in Queensland (Australia) requires that all adults working/undertaking professional experience/researching with children under the age of 18, in the state of Queensland must hold a valid blue card http://www.bluecard.qld.gov.au/volunteers/doineedabluecard.html OR exemption card http://www.bluecard.qld.gov.au/faqs/exemption-card-faqs.html.
If undertaking placement outside of Queensland you must ensure that all relevant checks are completed and evidence of this is provided to the Professional Experience office http://www.usq.edu.au/current-students/assessment/professional-experience.

Provided a blue card renewal application has been submitted at least 30 days before expiry of the current card, the blue card will remain active while the renewal application is processed (details available at https://bluecard.qld.gov.au/volunteers/whendoineedtoapply.html).

Blue Card Services cannot process a form dated more than 16 weeks prior to lodgement. In addition, a representative of USQ or a Justice of the Peace, must sight the applicant’s identification documents and check the information on the form, before signing and dating the USQ declaration (refer to https://www.usq.edu.au/current-students/assessment/education-placements/blue-card).

Where a student is denied approval for a blue card, enrolment in any initial teacher education program will be withdrawn (refer to https://www.bluecard.qld.gov.au/disqualification.html).
If undertaking Professional Experience outside of Queensland, students are advised to check the Working with Children requirements of the state within which Professional Experience will be undertaken (refer to https://www.usq.edu.au/current-students/assessment/education-placements/working-with-children).

Synopsis

This course will provide an introduction to key concepts about learner development, specifically cognitive, physical and psychosocial development. The course will examine different explanations for learning, including the behaviourist, cognitive and social-learning perspectives. Individual differences (e.g., intelligence, motivation and social-cultural factors) and how they affect the learning process will also be examined. On the completion of this course, pre-service educators will have an understanding of learner development, which they will apply when designing effective educational environments that promote learning. Pre-service educators will also develop the critical literacy skills to analyse and evaluate research literature. Embedded within the course is a 20 day Professional Experience under the supervision of a mentor teacher.

Course offers