Latest Module Specifications
Current Academic Year 2025 - 2026
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Description This module promotes children as agents in social, personal and global contexts. Drawing on concepts of human rights, wellbeing and citizenship, this module explores student teachers’ attitudes and dispositions towards key themes. Students will experience and critically reflect on active learning methods that can be used to engage children in democratic processes in SPHE. The module will support students in planning and resourcing lessons across the key concepts. This module also investigates historical and sociological aspects of Irish education with an emphasis on past, contemporary and future orientations. It examines the relationships between the structure and development of Irish education, on the one hand and political, economic and religious interests on the other. It also looks at the relationship between education and society by reviewing a range of theoretical perspectives and empirical studies on children, schools and social contexts. The module seeks to deepen students understanding of how social contexts/learning environments/teacher-pupil relationships impact on children’s intellectual, social and emotional development. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Learning Outcomes 1. Critically reflect on the significant role of personal dispositions, attitudes, assumptions, values and dominant discourses in shaping teacher action and behaviour. 2. Plan lessons, with a knowledge of curricular (SPHE Curriculum) and non-curricular resources for social, personal and health education, integrating good practice in relation to assessment, differentiation and digital learning. 3. Demonstrate awareness and understanding of the lived experience of education from historical and sociological perspectives. 4. Build on their prior learning and life experiences and actively seek out opportunities to develop professionally. 5. Engage in independent thought and reflective practice through an exploration of their role as teachers in contemporary societies. 6. Apply historical methods in an analysis of the structure and development of Irish education from 1831 to the present. 7. Demonstrate a sociological understanding of how identities, such as social class, gender and race affect groups of people and the role played by education in the reproduction or transformation of social inequalities | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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All module information is indicative and subject to change. For further information,students are advised to refer to the University's Marks and Standards and Programme Specific Regulations at: http://www.dcu.ie/registry/examinations/index.shtml |
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Indicative Content and Learning Activities
SPHE & Wellbeing SPHE & Wellbeing lectures and seminars cover the following elements: Inclusion and self-esteem; developing children’s skills (e.g. regulating and managing feelings, decision-making; self-confidence; self-awareness); relationships (family life and friendships); relating to others (e.g. communicating; resolving conflict); developing ground rules and class contracts; child protection, bullying and personal safety (fire, road, water and online); relationships and sexuality education; LGBTI+ issues in the primary school; media education; health and well-being (e.g. taking care of my body; food and nutrition); substance misuse and loss and bereavement. Specific teaching methods appropriate to delivering SPHE content is explored e.g. circle-time, carousels, talk and discussion, along with integration, planning and assessment. Students are encouraged to self-reflect through completing lecture and seminar learning logs. History of Education Strand This module presents a timeline of the history of education in Ireland, which will be an important point of reference for the discussions that follow. The structure and development of the primary school system will be the central focus of the module, and special emphasis will be placed on those periods when child-centred education became a feature of the system. The impact that various interest groups have had on its design and evolution will also be discussed. In the course of these discussions students will be introduced to key concepts in the field of historical research, e.g., testimony, archive, representation, and narrative. Students will be invited to reflect on the character and quality of testimonies found in the literature, and to compare and contrast the influential narratives of John Coolahan and Susan M. Parkes. They will also learn about the location of the most important historical documents pertaining to Irish education. Sociology of Education Strand The Sociology of Education component of the module will introduce students to some of the major themes in the sociology of education. Schools are complex social organisations that reflect, are influenced by and themselves shape broader society. To understand these processes, this component of the module will consider relationships among actors within schools (teachers, pupils, parents) and the impact of social contexts, national policies and pedagogical practices on children and learning. Topics include social mobility and stratification; parental involvement in schooling; the dynamics of social class, gender and race in education; constructs of intelligence and educational implications; power, surveillance and privacy in schools. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Indicative Reading List Books:
Articles:
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Other Resources
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