Year 2 - 15 CATS - OPTIONAL module

Year 3 - 15 CATS - OPTIONAL module

Year 4 (intercalated degree) - 15 CATS - OPTIONAL module

What is this module about?

This module will have an early years education focus and an emphasis of students being afforded an opportunity to develop their practical skills as creative facilitators in conjunction with their academic study of creativity within an early years context. This module concerns designing a creative intervention/session for nursery aged children (3-4 yrs). From a theoretical perspective it looks at creative development in early years children and early years educational settings.

Module Aims:

1) To examine contrasting definitions of creativity in relation to teaching, learning and education drawn from both national and international models.
2) To explore and interrogate how the concept of creativity is represented and interpreted within the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) curriculum (2013).
3) To explore the relationship between the concept of creativity and the concept of play.
4) To explore the relationship between the concept of creativity and the arts.
5) To examine the historical and political contexts in which policy relating to creativity has been developed in early years settings.
6) To explore a range of case studies where creative projects have been developed in early years settings.
7) To develop an awareness of the types of strategies that have been used to evaluate the impacts of creative practice within early years settings.
8) To provide students with an opportunity to practically apply their knowledge of creativity through designing and evaluating their own creative project.

Learning Outcomes:

1. To become familiar with key debates and concepts relating to creativity and early years education, both from a national and international perspective.
2. To explore and identify how contrasting versions of the EYFS have defined and incorporated the concept of creativity.
3. To develop new ways of applying creative thinking, behaviour and learning within one's university study.
4. To participate in a group project which supports children from the University’s nursery to take part in creative activity, and through this to develop enhanced creative facilitation skills and practical knowledge relating to how children develop their creativity.

Timetabled Teaching Activities:

30 hours of timetabled teaching activities. This will include short formal lectures, practical workshops and supervised studio time where students work in small groups to create their own short creative sessions for a small group of nursery children.

Assessment:

A two part written assessment consisting of 3,000 words. The first part of the written assessment requires students to write a proposal (1000 words) outlining the aims and objectives of their group’s creative session. Although students are working in small groups, they are required to produce individual proposals as opposed to a single group proposal. The second part of their written assessment requires students to write an evaluation of how their creative session was received by children, identifying both the strengths and weaknesses of their creative teaching and learning choices, alongside their ideas on what they would develop further should they run the session again in the future. In both assessments students are required to make reference to relevant theory and previous research relating to creativity and early years education.

Students will receive detailed feedback from the module leader on their creative session delivered in the nursery but this aspect of the module will not be formally examined.