If you're new to our program, here's a quick outline of what you can expect in years to come:
Our pathway consists of 3 consecutive courses
1. Early Childhood Education I: Aka The Baby Class. In this course, we look at careers with children, STD's, Pregnancy, Birth, Infancy, Toddlers, Preschoolers, School Age Children, Diversity, Special Needs, Educational Theorists, and Curriculum Development. We are in constant motion for 180 days!! This is the most action packed class for sure, and goes through all stages of development for children. In my opinion, this course gives you a solid foundation for your future even if you don't plan on teaching or working with young children, as most students are likely to be parents one day. This is the class where students "get the baby" that many of them so look forward to (I still struggle to understand this one). Our 10 precious babies are currently "in the hospital" getting a check up so they will be tuned up and ready to go in October. If you survive this class and still like children, you can move onto our second course...
2. Introduction to Early Childhood Education: Yeah, the course names are confusing, the state is in the process of changing all that in the next year. In this course, we spend a lot of our time across the street at Sweetwater Elementary working in the elementary classrooms, assisting teachers and students as much as we can. This year, we will go across the street 3 days/week; Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. We will spend Monday and Fridays in the classroom studying curriculum, educational theorists and learning about just what it takes to be an elementary age teacher. This class tends to show most students whether or not they want to pursue a career working with young children because they gain an invaluable experience working with young children. I took this class in 2001 with Ms. Lee and it changed the course for my life for sure! For some, it cements what they already knew about what they wanted to do with their life; for others, it sends them out the door screaming! Either way, most students learn A LOT about themselves in this course. If you've survived elementary kids for a year and haven't had it with Ms. Lee and I, you can move onto our 3rd and final course...
3. Health, Safety and Nutrition for the Young Child: This course is exactly what it says it is. You will spend the first half of the year learning about everything pertaining to children's health. From communicable diseases to sanitizing classrooms to child abuse and mental health, we cover it. The second half of the year we cover Safety and Nutrition topics from Fire Safety, Classroom and School Procedures and Safety to children's Nutrition and healthy eating habits. At the end of this course, each student takes an end of pathway exam that upon passing gives them certification and allows them to wear a CTAE completer cord when they graduate. The certification will aid them and boost them in the job search process when applying to jobs working with young children.
In the midst of all of this, we also sponsor the LSHS FCCLA Chapter, which is an organization for students in Family and Consumer Science courses. We participate in community service, go on awesome field trips and will compete in various competitions throughout the year. Membership is $30/year and the sooner you join, the more benefits you get from it. We'll go into more detail on this one soon...
We have great plans for this year and are looking forward to a whole new batch of first year students, and more quality time with our 2nd and 3rd year kiddos. If you need to contact either one of us at any time, feel free to email who you need at either evan.hopkins@douglas.k12.ga.us or rebecca.b.lee@douglas.k12.ga.us. The plan is to update the blog once a week...somewhere between teaching, meetings, grading, data collecting and everything else we teachers keep spinning in the air all the time.
2 weeks until the journey begins...
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