Master of Arts in Learning & Teaching (MALT)

The Master of Arts in Learning and Teaching (MALT) degree program is designed to transform teacher preparation from a teaching-centered paradigm to a learning-centered paradigm. The coursework, curriculum, and instructional delivery system present teaching and learning structures that create learner-centered environments, espouse a constructivist approach to learning theory that shapes knowledge and knowing as individually mediated experiences, and teaches how to learn as much as they teach what to learn. The MALT program mission incorporates the standards articulated in the NCATE, INTASC, NBPTS and Tennessee state initiatives.

The program includes 1) a Cohort Learning Community, 2) an Integrated Course Content Model, 3) a Pedagogy for Understanding Framework, 4) a Student Assessment and Program Evaluation Framework, 5) an Electronically-Mediated Learning Component, 6)  a Circle of Praxis Approach to Learning,  7)  an Enhanced Teaching Practicum, and  8) access to Licensure/Endorsement in Elementary Education (K-6) or Secondary Education (7-12).

For all questions related to MALT contact Steve Hull, 615-966-1811. 

Course of Study

The following courses (36 hours) are required for the MALT degree.  

Teachers who are currently teaching full-time will not be required to take LT 512C. A mentorship course for six hours and a case study and field research course for six hours will substitute for the 12-hour enhanced teaching component.

LT 5126  The ADEPTT (Teacher Training) Course

LT 5146  Case Study and Field Research

Course Descriptions

LT 5012  Teaching and Learning: Integrating Theory, Research and Practice (2)

Classroom practitioners learn to integrate into practice, new information, knowledge, and complex ideas about learning. The course focuses on how learning systems establish and foster learning communities; how classroom practitioners integrate research, theory, and practice in authentic classroom environments; and, how reflective practices and supportive structures become embedded in the educational ecology.

LT 5022  Exploring the Learner Development Continuum (2)

This course presents learning as process, applying Grow’s four-stage learning model in authentic classroom situations.This course presents learning as process, applying Grow’s four-stage learning model in authentic classroom situations.  Learners are viewed as dependent (Stage 1: requiring explicit coaching); seen as setting goals (Stage 2: moderately self-directed); having intermediate levels of self-direction (Stage 3: participants in their education); and, setting self goals (Stage 4: autonomous, self-directed). Four challenges in developing learner-centered teaching are addressed: I: Understanding the Development Process in Context, II: Responding to Students at Different Levels, III: Designing a Sequence of Learning Experiences, IV: Designing a Learning-centered Curriculum

LT 5032  Integrating Learning Domains through Transformative Practice (2)

A trans-disciplinary view of learning, including integration, development, and performance, shifts the learning paradigm from heuristic to integrated, accenting four growth domains: reasoning, development, performance, and self-reflection…each facilitating primary educational aims: 1) development of thinking skills (declarative knowledge); 2) development of holistic meaning; 3)A trans-disciplinary view of learning, including integration, development, and performance, shifts the learning paradigm from heuristic to integrated, accenting four growth domains: reasoning, development, performance, and self-reflection…each facilitating primary educational aims: 1) development of thinking skills (declarative knowledge); 2) development of holistic meaning; 3)  development of self-reflective strategies; and 4)  development of exemplary performance practice skills.

LT 5042  Protocols for Establishing Effective Learning Communities (2)

Authentic learning (moral, ethical and effective) is examined in the context of community and mutual concern. Establishing protocols for generating life enhancing learning, requires the teacher, administration, and all stakeholders to develop covenantal understandings, goals and a collective vision. Protocols for developing trust, positive intention and articulation of the moral voice are explored.

LT 5052  Educative Assessment: Promoting and Facilitating Learning (2)

Achievement targets, learning outcomes, performance standards, assessment protocols and product anthologies frame the pedagogy for understanding.Achievement targets, learning outcomes, performance standards, assessment protocols and product anthologies frame the pedagogy for understanding.  Assessment, both formative and summative, reveals learning outcomes, programs quality, and institutional efficiency.  Educative assessment (fostering academic introspection) is viewed as the fulcrum to reduce the gap between teaching intent and teaching effect.

LT 5062  Cultural and Social Impact of Learning, Thinking and Teaching (2)

Programmed learning, the development of thinking protocols (habits and processes of mind), and the styles, mechanisms and patterns of teaching, all arise from societal needs and influences of cultural. This course explores the anthro-cultural, sociological and economic influences on educational programming and the impact on teaching and learning.

LT 5072  Physiological and Psychological Foundations of Learning and Teaching (2)

Psychological and physiological factors originate learning experiences.Psychological and physiological factors originate learning experiences.  As source of “connecting to reality” they demand the resolution of dissonance.  The course explores environmental settings and their impact on cognitive, affective and psycho-motor development. Such elements as developmental phases, learning incentives, and teacher expectations contribute to the nature of how learning and teaching are accomplished. The learning code, reading code and thinking code are analyzed.

LT 5082  Experientially Modulated Authentic Learning and Teaching (2)

The course investigates learning content as it is culturally sourced, project based, self actualized, acquired through direct experience, interactive, self reflective and self correcting. It accents teaching performance as community grounded, assessment driven, teacher facilitated learner-centric, and content-context based. Lesson design and execution are project based, culturally connected, cooperative and learner-centered.The course investigates learning content as it is culturally sourced, project based, self actualized, acquired through direct experience, interactive, self reflective and self correcting. It accents teaching performance as community grounded, assessment driven, teacher facilitated learner-centric, and content-context based. Lesson design and execution are project based, culturally connected, cooperative and learner-centered. 

LT 5092  Foundations of Knowing: Acquiring Knowledge, and Creating Meaning (2)

Participants develop strategies for promoting learning and establishing effective practice in authentic classroom venues.Participants develop strategies for promoting learning and establishing effective practice in authentic classroom venues.  Participants study human potential through specific instruments including: Measures of Intellectual Development (MID), Critical Thinking Appraisal (CTA), and Test of Cognitive Development (TCD), among others. A classroom environment scale (CES) is used to measure a) involvement, affiliation, and teacher support; b) task orientation, task completion; c) order and organization, rule clarity, teacher control); and d) system innovation.

LT 5102  Dialogic and Interactive Teaching and Learning (2)

Dialogic interactions improve understanding, diminish dispute, apply ideas in new environments, and improve knowing in ways that promote the creation of meaning.Dialogic interactions improve understanding, diminish dispute, apply ideas in new environments, and improve knowing in ways that promote the creation of meaning.  Dependent on listening, suspending disbelief and concretized assumptions, and allowing time for thinking processes to mature enables deep inquiry, promotes understanding, and integrates thoughts. Dialogue invites interaction, establishes content in context, promotes knowing and meaning, and enables functional learning.

LT 5112  Reflective Teaching and Learning (2)

Reflective teaching is examined through practitioner habits of mind, manifest as practice, habits of inquiry, and habits of assessment. The model includes: 1) knowledge of self as teacher, 2) knowledge of content, 3) knowledge of teaching and learning, 4) knowledge of students, and 5) knowledge of school and societal contexts. Participants explore, apply, and evaluate the Circle of Praxis as a fulcrum for teaching and learning.

LT 512C  Enhanced Teaching: Performance as Transformative Experience (12)

Enhanced student teaching, a professional semester, includes full day teaching and observation as induction for teaching candidates. It includes ongoing reflective dialogue with a University mentor and LEA cooperating teachers. The experience focuses on individuals’ special needs and skills and on teaching in diverse settings. Seminars focus on application and analysis of teaching performance.

LT 5132  Culminating Project: Integrating Theory and Practice (2)

The culminating project demonstrates in-depth understanding of theory, and proficiency in application of self selected phases of teaching as each may influence learning.The culminating project demonstrates in-depth understanding of theory, and proficiency in application of self selected phases of teaching as each may influence learning.  From the perspective that teaching is a learnable art, and with an appreciation that research and development undergird the practice of this art, each candidate is required to develop a comprehensive project in an application of educative practice.

For teachers:

LT 5126  The ADEPTT (Teacher Training) Course (6)

The ADEPTT (Accelerated Development and Exemplary Professional Teacher Training) course addresses the needs of uncertified teachers who are working under the provisions of alternative licensure or permit status. It offers comprehensive training in the protocols, frameworks, and practices that will enable classroom practitioners to successfully engage in teaching while they simultaneously develop the knowledge, skills, dispositions and competencies necessary to achieve permanent licensure. The course helps teachers avoid isolation by promoting the development of professional camaraderie. It also introduces beginning teachers to the fellowship of educators by building skills crafted in an atmosphere of cooperation. In addition, new teachers are mentored by experienced practitioners who help them attain exceptional skills, insights and professional dispositions. This course consists of 18 four-hour graduate study sessions that orient program participants to job-specific tasks, including lesson design, instructional delivery and evaluation, skills and content-specific assessment design, behavior management strategies and the review of myriad practices mandated by NCLB and IDEA.

LT 5146  Case Study and Field Research (6)

This course addresses the need for educators to identify, prioritize, and use selected research methodologies to solve classroom and/or departmental problems. This offering integrates the reflective seminar orientation of LT 5113 with research strategies to yield practical and proven remedies for educational problems, including issues of student achievement, classroom management, pedagogy and assessment. The focus of this course is on facilitating authentic action research and culminates in a classroom, departmental or school-wide case study. Seminars focus on qualitative and quantitative methodologies as they relate to the case study approach. Program participants, working in collaboration with a university professor and a site-based (i.e., school) mentor, identify a significant problem that is currently affecting the teaching/learning process, facilitate rigorous academic research on the identified issue, facilitate the development of a case study based on a clear hypothesis, and construct a Plan of Action to remedy the identified problem.