What opportunities will you have to interact with children if you come to Coe?
Education students at Coe complete at least two field experiences in area schools before their full time student teaching semester. In addition to these program-related experiences, our students have the opportunity to work with children in many area programs: Coe Friends pairs college students with children from nearby Polk Elementary School for social activities throughout the school year; Coe students can volunteer to work with children whose parents are incarcerated through the Children of Promise program; Coe students can use their work study funds to tutor in area schools.
What other kind of teaching-related activities are offered at Coe?
Several of Coe’s recent May term classes have provided education students with outstanding teaching-related experiences.
- Education Assistant Professor Christy Wolfe taught an off-campus class in May of 2010 on Equity in Education. Ten students explored ideas and philosophies behind educational strategies that address inequity in education, including home-schooling, dual language schools, and urban education charter schools. Students visited programs across eastern Iowa and also spent a week-plus in Chicago, visiting numerous charter schools.
- Education Professor Roger Johanson has led groups of Coe students on a May term course in Costa Rica eight times, most recently in May 2011. During their time in this beautiful country, students study Paulo Friere’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, among other readings.
- Rhetoric Professor Deb Wooldridge leads an annual intensive intercultural service learning program on a Lakota (Sioux) Indian Reservation. Students are immersed into Lakota reservation life through volunteering at Sitting Bull Day School and living in the community. Students study history, communication patterns and behaviors, cultural practices and ceremonies, and social issues among Indians, largely through experiential learning.
Also, during the spring 2008 term, five education students completed their Practicum requirement at the Chiang Mai International School in Chiang Mai, Thailand, under the supervision of Education Professor Terry McNabb. Asia term is offered every spring.
Where can you do your student teaching?
While the vast majority of Coe students complete their student teaching in area schools, education students who are interested in a different kind of experience have three additional options:
- Coe has a long-standing association with the Aldine Independent School district in Aldine, Texas. The Aldine district offers a student teaching experience in a school with a highly diverse student population with excellent support from district staff. Learn more at http://www.aldine.k12.tx.us.
- Coe students can live and student teach through The Chicago Center Program, which has provided urban teaching experiences for more than 40 years. Read more at http://www.chicagocenter.org/.
- Through the University of Northern Iowa, students have the opportunity to student teach in schools all over the world. In the fall of 2010, Kim Hoff completed her student teaching in K-12 Art at Moshi International School in Tanzania.