Mathematics on the Early Childhood Education Curriculum
Code: 101986 ECTS Credits: 4| Degree | Type | Year | Semester |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2500797 Early Childhood Education | OB | 3 | 1 |
Contact
- Name:
- Gemma Sala Sebastià
- Email:
- gemma.sala@uab.cat
Use of Languages
- Principal working language:
- catalan (cat)
- Some groups entirely in English:
- No
- Some groups entirely in Catalan:
- Yes
- Some groups entirely in Spanish:
- No
Teachers
- María Neus Font Garriga
Prerequisites
Despite not being any official prerequisites to enrol this course, it is strongly recommendable that students had already passed the annual subject of first course:
- Personality development
Objectives and Contextualisation
This course is for students that had been passed all the basic training.
This course is about specific didactics in mathematics, and is done simultaneously with other specific didactics courses. The main themes of the course are the knowledge of the mathematics curriculum in early childhood education, the main specific mathematical contents: logics and numbers, with special emphasis on the zero to three year old period.
The 4th year subject "Mathematical Practice in the Early Childhood Education Classrooms" has to be understood as the natural continuation of this course. Once all compulsory subjects of didactics in mathematics are passed, one has the possibility to enrol, in the very last semester of the degree, the subject entitled "Mathematical Games and Activities in Early Childhood Education".
Objectives of the course:
1.- To be familiar with the main topics of the curriculum in early age education in the period from zero to six years old, with special emphasis in mathematics.
2.- To be familiar with the mathematical contents of the curriculum in the periods from zero to three and from three to six years old: logics and numbers.
3.- To be familiar with the ways to engage mathematical activities from zero to six year old.
4.- To design situations of mathematical learning in the period from zero to three year old.
Competences
- Consider classroom practical work to innovate and improve teaching.
- Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the aims, curricular contents and criteria of evaluation of Infant Education
- Make changes to methods and processes in the area of knowledge in order to provide innovative responses to society's needs and demands.
- Promote and facilitate early infant learning, from a global and integrative perspective of different cognitive, emotional, psychomotor and developmental dimensions.
- Promoting experiences of initiation into information and communication technologies.
- Properly express oneself orally and in writing and master the use of different expression techniques.
- Understand teaching strategies to develop numerical representations and spatial geometric and logical development notions,.
- Understand the scientific, mathematical and technological bases of the curriculum at this stage as well as theories on the acquisition and development of the corresponding learning.
Learning Outcomes
- Analyse a situation and identify its points for improvement.
- Be able to communicate in writing by making a personal draft, having documented and referenced the texts consulted.
- Be able to find and evaluate the relevance and adequacy of technologies for learning and knowledge for teaching and learning mathematics in kindergarten and nursery school.
- Be able to locate and select mathematical content and learning objectives in the curriculum.
- Be able to orally communicate synthesis of the most relevant aspects of a job using various technologies for learning and knowledge and in the required time.
- Be able to select appropriate materials and situations for the nursery to promote learning and autonomy while respecting the uniqueness of each child.
- Have the capacity to organize both personal and group work to perform the tasks required of the subject.
- Know about professional support, physical and web-based resources.
- Know of the structure, content, organization and utility of curricula of reference.
- Propose new methods or well-founded alternative solutions.
- Understand the diversity of materials and situations suitable for the development of mathematical thinking in kindergartens.
- Understand the mathematical and didactic foundations of the curriculum for this stage regarding geometry and measurement.
- Understand the mathematical and didactic foundations of the curriculum for this stage regarding logic and numbers.
- Understand theories on the development of mathematical thinking in early childhood.
Content
This subject have 4 main content blocks:
1.- Curriculum and mathematical contents in early age education
1.1. Official regulations (DECRET 101/2010, de 3 d’agost; DECRET 282/2006, de 4 de juliol; DECRET 181/2008, de 9 de setembre; ORDRE EDU/484/2009, de 2 de novembre).
1.2. Curriculum and the role of mathematics in it.
1.3. Psychological theoretical framework of teaching and learning mathematics. Constructivist approach.
2.- The development of mathematical Logic reasoning in early ages
2.1. How is mathematical logic reasoning developed in early ages, 0-3 i 3-6.
2.2. Materials for the development of logic thinking in early ages 0-3: Specific and unspecific materials.
2.3. Situations - transition from the first to the second year: treasure basket and heuristic game.
2.4. Situations - from the second to the third year: experimentation tray, daily life situations, eating time, etc.
3.- The development of mathematical thinking from 3-6 year old and its continuity
3.1. Organization of the mathematical contents in four fundamental parts.
3.2. Logics: attributes and collectables. Relationships and change. Pattern searching.
4.- Numbers and operations
4.1. Numbers and operations. Quantifiers. Construction of the number. To read and write numbers down. Actions on the quantity: to add, to subtract, to group, to split, to repeat, etc.
4.2. The decimal numeric system. Mental calculus.
Methodology
|
Activity |
Time needed |
Methodology Our teaching approach and assessment procedures may be altered if public health authorities impose new restrictions on public gatherings for COVID-19. |
|
Classroom activity Whole group |
10 |
Lectures of the basic themes of the subject. It is done with the whole group, who is encouraged to actively participate. Each session will usually finish with a brief explanation of the tasks to be performed both individually and in the seminar. |
|
Seminars Reduced groups |
20 |
Workspaces in reduced groups (50% of the whole group) with the supervision of the lecturers where the students have to deepen in the concepts and themes they have dealt with. |
|
Monitoring seminars Reduced groups |
20 |
Workspaces in smaller groups where students present their work with the supervision of the lecturers. |
|
Personal work |
50 |
Students have to look for references on their own to deepen the contents of the subject. Always with the guidance of the professor. Moreover, they have to finish all the activities proposed in the seminars and to consolidate all they have learned. |
Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.
Activities
| Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type: Directed | |||
| Classroom activity, whole group and seminars | 30 | 1.2 | 7, 4, 3, 5, 2, 6, 11, 9, 14, 8, 12, 13 |
| Type: Supervised | |||
| Individual or small group work | 20 | 0.8 | |
| Type: Autonomous | |||
| Personal work | 50 | 2 | 2, 9, 14, 8 |
Assessment
Our teaching approach and assessment procedures may be altered if public health authorities impose new restrictions on public gatherings for COVID-19.
The evaluation of the progress of each student will be done along the whole semester by the activities in the next table.
It is mandatory to attend to all the classes to be evaluated. But at most 20% of the total can be missed due to justified incidents. In any other case, the final mark will be 'not presented'. This will also be the case if any of the mandatory activities are not delivered on time. One can only be graded if at least a mark of 5 has been obtained in each of the activities listed below.
In case the students have not obtained the minimal mark to pass (5 points) there is the option to do a single indivilual exam to reavaluate at the end of the course (10-01-2023 to students of group 62 and 12-01-2023 to students of group 61) if they fulfill ALL the following conditions: they have attended to all the sessions (at most 20% of the total can be missed due to justified incidents), they delivered all the activities on time and the activities that didn't have the mark to pass (5 points) have obtained 3,5 points at least.
|
Assesment Activitities |
% mark |
Time | What and when? |
|
Individual written-tests |
50% (40% + 10%) |
2 classroom activity + personal work |
A written -test with questions related to competency achivement of the subject (40%). A written test about some articles related to the contents of the subject (10%) At the end of all teaching units. 20-12-2022 (group 62) / 22-12-2022 (group 61) |
|
Group work |
20% (10% + 10%) |
4 classroom activity + personal work |
Task 1: The main topic will be the period from zero to three years old (10%). Task 2: The main topic will be the period from three to six years old (10%). Each group will deliver an essay and will do a presentation in the monitoring seminars. The first task will be presented about the middle of period of the subject and the second one about the end.
|
|
Work in seminars, both individually and ingroups |
30% (10% individual + 20% en grup) |
20 classroom activity + personal work |
The work in seminars will be focused in the main parts of the mathematical contents of the subject. Each group will deliver a unique document that contains all the work done in the seminars (20%) with an individual final essay (10%). Continous assessment during the development of the seminars and sumative evaluation at the end of all teaching units. |
All the activities delivered to thelecturers that can be marked will be returned to the students within one month,
It is mandatory to have good oral andwritten communicative competencies in order to pass the subject. Moreover, one has to be fluent in all the common languages that are stated in the study guide.
Also, the attitude of students hasto be compatible with that of a teacher in order to pass the subject. For instance, one expects them to show active listening, to be respectful, participative, to cooperate, to show empathy, to be nice, punctual, etc.
Copy and plagiarism in the delivered activities and exams constitute a criminal attitude that can lead to failing the subject.
- An activity or exam will be considered to be 'copied' if it is a partial or total reproduction of a classmate's activity or exam.
- An activity willbe considered to be 'plagiarized' if it is presented as one own work and is a literal reproduction of another author's text (partially or totally) without referencing the originals (More information on plagiarism can be found in http://wuster.uab.es/web_argumenta_obert/unit_20/sot_2_01.html).
Further information on evaluation procedures can be found inthe document: “Criteris i pautes generals d’avaluació de la Facultat de Ciències de l’Educació” aprovat per la COA a 28 de maig de 2015 (http://www.uab.cat/web/informacio-academica/avaluacio/normativa-1292571269103.html, in catalan).
Assessment Activities
| Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Final Exams (individual) | 50% | 0 | 0 | 1, 2, 9, 12, 13, 10 |
| Group works | 20% | 0 | 0 | 1, 7, 4, 3, 5, 2, 6, 11, 14, 8, 10 |
| Work in seminars (10% individually and 20% groups) | 30% | 0 | 0 | 1, 7, 3, 5, 2, 14, 10 |
Bibliography
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Departament d’Ensenyament (2016). Currículum i orientacions d’Educació Infantil Segon Cicle. Disponible a: http://ensenyament.gencat.cat/web/.content/home/departament/publicacions/colleccions/curriculum/curriculum-infantil-2n-cicle.pdf
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Software
No specific software is used.