Arts (Children's Studies)

This programme provides unique and applied training that is not available anywhere else in Europe. The Arts (Children’s Studies) programme provides students with the knowledge, confidence and transferable skills to identify their preferred career path. Students on this programme are expected to work with children from the very first semester and throughout the four years, including a semester-long placement, thus mixing the academic experience with practical work.

Graduates will be well-placed to pursue careers in community development work, as integration support assistants (special needs assistants), and research, as well as to gain entry to postgraduate degrees in primary teaching, play therapy, social work, speech and language therapy, health promotion, arts administration, and public advocacy.

This programme is an excellent choice for students who would like to pursue a career as primary school teachers, as it also includes an option to study Gaeilge as part of the programme (optional); our graduates are very successful in applying to the PME (primary school teaching) as well as to other professional postgraduate degrees in social work and play therapy, largely due to the significant service-learning and work placement experience they gather throughout the degree.

Year 1

• Introduction to Children’s Studies
• Children in Social Contexts
• Children and Fairy tales
• Children and Health
• History of Childhood
• Developmental Psychology

Year 2

• Exploring Irish Childhoods
• Adolescents in Ireland: Healthy and Risky Behaviour
• Research Methods
• Child Law
• Educational Pedagogies: Policies and Practice
• Children and Storytelling

Year 3

• Child-Centred Research (Philosophy for Children)
• Children and Transitions
• Children and Play
• Twenty-First-Century Young Adult Literature
• Semester-Long Placement/Exchange

Year 4

• Children’s Rights
• Children and Theatre
•  E-Literacy
• Connecting Research, Practice, and Policy in Children’s Lives
• Children, Culture and Media
• Applied Behavioural Analysis
• Supporting Children with Diverse Needs

Equivalent modules may be substituted from time to time for any of the above under exceptional circumstances and when approved by the College of Arts, Social Sciences, and Celtic Studies

Students who take a foreign language as part of their BA(Children’s Studies) will have the option to study for a semester at a European University under the ERASMUS exchange programme and/or carry out their second semester work placement abroad