Literacy Concentration Description

Become a literacy expert, trained to face learners who are diverse in age, background, abilities, experiences, locations and needs. You will be trained to impart a gift to all learners: to read for life. In our highly literate society, successful literacy teaching matters. A fluent reader in school can engage all subjects independently, with more opportunities for social participation. Literacy opens doors for careers and socio-economic mobility. By teaching literacy well, you are also giving students an enhanced ability to be citizens, to access to government services, to express themselves, to seek justice in law, to take better care of their health, to explore and deepen faith and to nourish personal interests. And this, of course, barely scratches the surface.

At Calvin University we prepare professional leaders for literacy education. We support the development of your professional understandings and pedagogical skills. Together we explore relevant research, theory and practices as they vary from the learning needs of an early emergent reader to more developed struggling and non-struggling readers. We extend your assessment abilities from diagnosis to instructional responses. We identify and grapple with issues and situations that affect learners who negotiate poverty, oppression and other barriers to success. By the end of our program you are prepared to teach and support other teachers with confidence.

Michigan-certified teachers who successfully complete this program and pass the Reading Specialist MTTC test will qualify for the K-12 Reading Specialist teaching endorsement.

Required core course (3 credits):

Flexible core courses: choose three (9 credits)

Concentration courses (9 credits)

Elective courses (9 credits)

    or Elective 1
  •  Elective 2
  •  Elective 3

Total Semester Hours: at least 30 credits

Advisor

James Rooks

James Rooks

Professor
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