Become a literacy specialist or an educator with expertise in integrating the teaching of reading and writing into your curriculum for middle and high school students of all learning levels. Through course work and multiple fieldwork placements, you’ll become eligible to earn the New York State Literacy Specialist Certificate.
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Degree Details
Official Degree Title
Master of Arts in Literacy Education, Grades 5–12, Professional Certification
Professional Licensure or Certification
Format
Full-time or Part-time
Credits
34
Start Date
Fall
Application Deadline
Nationally recognized, full-time faculty members will teach most of your courses, ensuring that you learn:
- Explicit techniques for teaching reading and writing skills to middle and high school students with varying levels of ability
- Methods for meeting the literacy needs within specific subject areas such as science, math, English, and social studies
- Supportive strategies for the literacy and language development of diverse learners at varying developmental stages, skill levels, and socio-cultural contexts
- A diagnostic-intervention protocol to guide all children's progress toward English Language Arts (ELA) standards
- Leadership skills for facilitating school literacy improvement as a literacy coach
- Specialized strategies for supporting students with literacy-associated difficulties
Where Theory and Practice Meet
Through courses that help you understand the principles of language and literacy learning, you’ll begin to interpret literacy as the variety of ways in which people think, learn, and communicate through reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Our program emphasizes the utilization of current research in word recognition, comprehension, vocabulary, and expressive writing, as well as the development of diverse learners.
Extensive Field Experiences
You’ll have opportunities to incorporate the application of the content you’re learning in the classroom out in the field, and often in your school or classroom if you are a practicing teacher. You will also complete a culminating Clinical Literacy Practicum, in which you’ll engage in supervised, long-term individualized tutoring with children who have literacy difficulties.
The Literacy Education program is open to candidates who hold or are eligible for a provisional certificate in middle or secondary education or an initial certificate in either middle childhood or adolescence education.This degree leads to eligibility for the New York State Literacy Specialist Certificate.
Upon graduation, you’ll be prepared for a number of careers including:
- Classroom teacher or interventionist with specialized expertise teaching reading and writing in grades 5–12 in both public and private schools
- School literacy specialist or literacy coach, including as a part of the NYC DOE literacy specialist hiring initiative
- Literacy expert in clinical settings, including private tutoring, dyslexia intervention, and psycho-educational centers
- Editor or publisher of educational materials for literacy teaching and assessment
Learn more about teacher certification and our degree's accreditation.
Questions
If you have any additional questions about our degree, please feel free to contact Carolyn Strom, Program Director at carolyn.strom@nyu.edu.