Welcome, co-learner and co-teacher!

Welcome to Butte College and CDF63 (Early Childhood Education Curriculum)!

My name is Dr. Shaun-Adrián Choflá, and I will be serving as your co-learner and co-teacher in the Fall 2024 semester. Our online class is a late start, which means we won't start until October 21.

I am checking in early to help you get settled before October.

With care,

Dr. Choflá

(Él/Him/Them)

COURSE INFO

Let's talk about Early Childhood Education Curriculum!

Let's take a trip for a moment. I want you to think back to your childhood experiences in school, as far back as you can remember. Whether you remember your preschool, kindergarten, or first-grade years, as a child, think about a time you really enjoyed learning. My memory has to do with first grade, but your memory could be with a relative or childhood friend. It doesn't have to be something you did in school or anything formal like being taught, but something you learned, where you were joyful and happy.

My first-grade teacher, Mrs. Cochran, loved bees. We watched videos about bees, talked about them, created artwork, and even got to see working beehives. I was mesmerized by the honeycomb she brought in for us to explore, which likely explains why I love honey so much. But it was fascinating to hear the bees, see them, and then explore a honeycomb. I think about my first-grade year with great fondness because of the bees. The joyful discovery of bees is what I still remember about first grade.

With your joyful learning memory in mind, I want you now to think about what "curriculum" had to do with your memory. Let's take a step back and consider what the word curriculum even means. I shared my story above about bees. Where did the curriculum begin and end? If you had to go back in time and pick up "the curriculum" from your memory (or even from my story) and place it on a desk, what would you pick up? It gets blurry. Things intersect. If you have to point out "curriculum," it soon begins to become abstract.

Before we begin our class, please consider this childhood experience and the word curriculum, what it means to you, and how you have heard the term being used.

That is where we will begin together on our discovery of early childhood education curriculum.

MY TEACHING PHILOSOPHY

Dr. Chofla with workshop participants behind him smiling and waving

My teaching philosophy is that, just like you, I am both a co-learner and a co-teacher and that together, as a learning community, we will build knowledge together. All of us in this class will be learning with and from each other.

This teaching approach reflects how I teach and what it means to me to be a teacher. Four goals underpin my philosophy: (1) increasing student self-efficacy and personal empowerment, (2) differentiating

instruction to support diverse learners, (3) ensuring that curricula are relevant and meaningful, and (4) providing authentic collaboration and community-building opportunities.

My philosophy and these four goals describe the essence of my teaching philosophy, not just for this class but all of my classes, whether at the community college, graduate school or even when learning with and from young children.

COLLECTIVE
EXPECTATIONS

Six people holding an individual puzzle piece, placed together creating a blue connected rectangle

What you can expect from me

I will be vulnerable and take the same types of risks that I ask you to take.
I will provide you with a clear, organized course designed to ensure you meet our course goals meaningfully.
I will provide a mixture of resources and engaging activities to meet your learning needs.
I will be actively present in your learning. I will respond to your canvas messages and emails promptly and provide timely feedback on your assignment submissions.
I will reach out to you when I feel you might need support.
I will treat you with dignity and respect and be flexible to support your individual needs.
I will view my own mistakes as an opportunity to learn and grow and embrace all feedback you graciously share with me.

What I will expect from you

You will be open to taking risks, with the understanding that disequilibrium, those feelings of fear we feel doing new things, are an important aspect of our growth and development.
You will strive to be an active co-learner in this course and strive to meet due dates.
You will maintain an open line of communication with me, so I understand how to support you. You will reach out with questions as soon as, if not before, you begin to feel confused or frustrated.
You will strive to regularly contribute to collaborative activities to ensure other members of our learning community have ample opportunity to read/listen, reflect, and respond to your ideas.
You will treat your co-learners with dignity and respect, understanding that wherever others are right now in their learning, at this moment, is exactly where they need to be.
You will do your best to have patience with technology and yourself in navigating it. There will be hiccups; expect them. Let me know, and we will get through them together.

CO-LEARNING PARTNERSHIP

Hands holding earth and a small plant budding

As a co-learner and co-teacher in Early Childhood Education Curriculum, your voice is needed, wanted, valued, and critical to our collaborative learning journey.

The environment in this class should be one of safety; therefore, it is important that we collectively respect one another’s thoughts, ideas, and feelings and listen with an engaged and caring ear.

In a class where there is more participation, you might experience moments of disequilibrium. These moments of imbalance can be challenging, and they can create tensions and conflicts within us and our interactions with others. Disequilibrium is a positive aspect of our development because out of disequilibrium comes real learning. To this end, we must all take risks to grow effectively and become fully empowered humans and future professionals who can support others in validating and transformative ways.

Communication Essentials

Image illustrating different types of communication

Once you log into Canvas after the semester starts, my preferred method of communication is Canvas messages.

Because I am in Canvas so often, I respond to Canvas messages incredibly quickly, typically within minutes or hours, but during super busy days, it might take me up to 24 hours from Monday-Friday.

But, if you need to reach me prior to the start of class, please email me at choflash@butte.edu.

Contact Me

RESOURCE

Starting something new can be overwhelming. I get it! Before logging into the canvas or starting the semester, I thought you would want to know what books you need to access for our class.

Textbook:

Your book in this course is an open educational resource freely available to you and embedded within Canvas. There is nothing for you to buy, and you do not need to do anything to read it online. Each week, I will post your reading assignments marked in Canvas.

You can also freely download or print it without violating copyright law if you wish. Otherwise, I will provide you with electronic versions of your weekly reading assignments as we step through the course together.

STEPS TO SUCCESS

Whether you have experience working with (or raising) children or not, you are in the right class. I am so glad you joined me!

How do you plan for and study in this class?

Succeeding in college has a great deal to do with self-management. As you settle into class, here are some things that will help you organize your time.

Start early each week: We will step through each weekly module together, which is broken into many small chunks. So, jumping in early (on Monday) and working on one to-do item at a time is key!
Stay together and connected: Students often take online classes because they are convenient. (I myself am a student taking online classes as part of a graduate program.) But I also know staying together and connecting with me and your co-learners (your classmates) is helpful. We are in this together!
Reach out for help: If you have a question or are struggling, please don't hesitate to reach out. I care about your success but don't always know you are struggling.

COURSE GOALS

Each college course has what we refer to as Student Learning Outcomes or course goals. Think of these as an umbrella under which everything in this class will sit.

Once we start our class, I will be breaking these down a bit for you in smaller pieces, but for now, the following provides you with a broad understanding of where we are going in this class.

Throughout our semester, you will, in many ways:

Explore various early childhood curriculum models, approaches, and professional practices to inform and evaluate curriculum and environments.
Explain how the curriculum is integrated across all developmental domains and content areas.
Observe and evaluate teaching strategies, curriculum, and environmental designs.
Observe children as a basis for planning curriculum and environments.
Use knowledge of academic discipline content and children’s growth, development, and individual characteristics to plan and developmentally and linguistically appropriate learning experiences for infants and toddlers through the early primary years.
Develop plans for physical environments that are appropriate for children’s individual ages and stages, skills and abilities, needs, and learning goals.
Explain how different teaching strategies could be used for a variety of curriculum goals.
Describe guidance and interaction approaches to support social relationships and learning.
Explain how the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) are applied in various situations, and how specific learning experiences could be adapted to address individual children’s learning and development needs.
Describe various strategies for engaging and partnering with families to support children’s development and learning.

Assignments

Reading

Media

Lectures

Discussions

SUPPORT FOR YOU

We all need help at one point in life; indeed, we all need support resources when balancing life and school. Here is only a small collection of resources we have available at Butte College. Please let me know if you need someone else, and I will be happy to support you. I will also provide a more comprehensive list in our canvas classroom.

You can also call the friendly folks at the Butte College call center at 530-895-2511, who can provide you with additional information and assistance.

READY?

Three kids with helmets on, all with lightbulbs on top

You can log into the canvas classroom on Monday, October 21, at 7 AM (not at the beginning of the semester). I look forward to virtually meeting you then!