The BA in Childhood Studies at Essex is an interdisciplinary degree where we explore the social and emotional worlds of children from birth to 25. It is a wonderful introduction for students wishing to deepen their knowledge about children's lives and forge a career in children's education, health and well-being.Children today face a wide range of new and challenging experiences, including unprecedented access to media, wider cultural diversity, online bullying and larger school numbers. Their early experiences of childhood affect them for the rest of their lives. You can make a positive contribution to these formative years.Childhood studies is a vibrant and exciting field which has expanded in recent years to include knowledge from psychology, sociology and psychoanalysis. This course lays the foundations for a career working with infants and children, whether in education, health care or children’s services. It can also lead to further study in a range of courses from social work or teaching to speech and language therapy.You gain a solid understanding of child development, the ecology of childhood (the place of children in different societies) and consider the way our concepts of childhood shape and condition children’s lives. You will also learn about the direct work with children through undertaking a placement in each year of study where you can begin to make links between theory and practice in year one this placement can be with children of any age, in year two this is focussed on infant observation. Assessment is mainly by course work.