Conceptual Framework: UNT Programs for Educator Preparation

Educators as Guides for Engaged Learners

Improving the quality of education in Texas schools and elsewhere is the goal of programs for the education of educators at the University of North Texas. To achieve this goal, programs leading to teacher certification and advanced programs for educators at the University of North Texas:

• emphasize content, curricular, and pedagogical knowledge acquired through research and informed practice of the academic disciplines
• incorporate the Texas Teacher Proficiencies for learner centered education
• feature collaboration across the university and with schools and other agencies in the design and delivery of programs, and
• respond to the rapid demographic, social, and technological change in the United States and the world

Educators as guides for engaged learners summarizes the conceptual framework for UNT’s basic and advanced programs. This concept is portrayed visually as a compass, which represents the tools educators employ as they orient students in the exploration of landscapes for learning.

The engagement of learners requires simultaneous commitment to academic knowledge bases and to learner-centered practice. The orientation of engaged learners requires commitment to the continuous processes of assessment, planning, implementation, and evaluation that characterize discovery, problem-solving, curriculum development, program development, inquiry, and research.

Guiding engaged learners features on-going dialogue between educators and their students and with wider communities about how schools can prepare students for life-long learning in a democracy.

Guiding engaged learners draws on six areas of competence developed in all UNT programs for educators.

1. Content and curricular knowledge refers to the grounding of educators in content knowledge and knowledge construction and in making meaningful to learners the content of the P-16 curriculum. READ MORE... 
2. Pedagogical knowledge of teaching and assessment refers to the ability of educators to assess, plan, implement, and evaluate teaching and learning in terms of its consistent engagement of learners. READ MORE... 
3. Promotion of equity for all learners refers to the skills and attitudes that enable educators to advocate for all students within the framework of the school program. READ MORE... 
4. Encouragement of diversity refers to the ability of educators to appreciate, affirm, and engage the various cultural heritages, unique endowments, learning styles, interests, and needs of learners. READ MORE... 
5. Professional communication refers to effective interpersonal and professional oral and written communication that includes appropriate applications of information technology. READ MORE... 
6. Engaged professional learning refers to the commitment of educators to ethical and caring practice and to continued learning and professional development. READ MORE...

Through the experiences required in each UNT program of study, we expect that basic and advanced students will acquire the knowledge, skills, and dispositions appropriate to the educational roles for which they are preparing or in which they are developing expertise.

A broad community stands behind and accepts responsibility for every engaged learner. UNT supports the work of P-16 communities through basic and advanced programs for professional educators and by promoting public understanding of issues in education.