13A.12.02.03

.03 Certification in Early Childhood Education (Prekindergarten—Grade 3).

A. To receive certification in early childhood education (prekindergarten—grade 3), the applicant shall:

(1) Complete one of the following options:

(a) Earn a bachelor's or higher degree from an IHE with a major in interdisciplinary studies or a major in an academic field taught in early childhood education including a minimum of 12 semester hours of course work in both mathematics and science and 9 semester hours of course work in both English and social studies; or

(b) Earn a bachelor's or higher degree from an IHE and complete not less than 48 semester hours of content course work taken at an IHE including a minimum of 12 semester hours of course work in both mathematics and science and 9 semester hours of course work in both English and social studies;

(2) Complete 27 semester hours of professional education course work taken at an IHE, including a course in each of the following at the appropriate age or grade level:

(a) Child development;

(b) Human learning;

(c) Teaching methodology;

(d) Inclusion of special needs student populations;

(e) Assessment of students;

(f) Processes and acquisition of reading skills;

(g) Best practices in reading instruction that include the cuing systems of graphophonics, semantics, and syntactics;

(h) Use of reading assessment data to improve instruction; and

(i) Materials for teaching reading to gain literary experience, to perform a task, and to read for information; and

(3) Complete a teaching experience in one of the following ways:

(a) A supervised experience in a public or accredited nonpublic school setting at the prekindergarten or kindergarten and primary age/grade level; or

(b) 1 year of successful full-time teaching experience in a public or accredited nonpublic school setting at the prekindergarten, kindergarten, or primary age/grade level.

B. The course work required in §A(2)(f)—(i) of this regulation may also be taken through CPDs.

C. A minimum of 50 percent of the course work required in §A(1) and (2) of this regulation shall be taken at the same institution.