This four-year initial teaching certification program prepares candidates to nurture and teach infants, toddlers and preschoolers and children in primary grade settings (kindergarten through second grade). The 120-credit Early Childhood Program offers candidates the opportunity to contribute to a strong foundation during a child's formative years. Grounded in the social constructivist approach to early care and education, candidates in the Early Childhood Program develop a view of young children as meaning-makers, creative innovators, problem solvers and theory builders who are proactive in constructing their schema of the world. With the goal of creating critical, multicultural and democratic contexts, teacher candidates strengthen their awareness of children's literacies, languages, layers of identity and universal modes of learning so that they can fully support them as learners.