PSY 332 Child Development
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Miami University |
Cecilia Shore |
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Spring 2005 |
126D Benton |
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Meeting time TR 9:30-10:45 am |
529-2401 shorec@muohio.edu |
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course website on http://blackboard.muohio.edu |
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Texts: The
Many Faces of Childhood: Diversity in Development. Shore, C. (2004) Allyn & Bacon.
Additional readings on
electronic reserve via www.lib.muohio.edu.
Password is psy332.
Course
Description
This
course is an advanced course in child development. It is expected that all students will have
completed an introductory course in developmental psychology and, like all
advanced courses in psychology, it is preferred that you have completed a
course in statistics and research methodology.
It is the second course in a Miami Plan Thematic Sequences on Patterns
in Human Development. The purposes of
the course are 1) to meet Miami Plan goals for liberal education, 2) to foster the growth of skills in
extracting information from primary source literature, including a basic
understanding of quantitative methods typical of developmental research, 3) to foster the growth of critical thinking
skills in oral and written modes, thus strengthening your oral and written
communication skills, 4) to introduce
students to ways in which psychologists
formalize the idea of multiple determinants of development, including the
notion of embedded systems, and 5) to help students understand the
relationships among theories, methods, empirical findings, and practical
applications of developmental research.
For the Thematic Sequence on Patterns in Human Development: This course is the second course in a
thematic sequence on developmental psychology.
As human beings move through life, their thoughts, feelings, and
behaviors change. This sequence will
focus on how and why we develop, and how psychologists investigate and explain
changes in human behavior. In previous
courses, you were introduced to the range of psychological functioning, and to
the issues and problems in studying how these change over time. Now that you have begun to think about
psychology from a developmental perspective, in this course we will focus on a
particular segment of the lifespan—childhood.
Plans
for Meeting Course Objectives
Thinking critically. The discipline of developmental psychology
aspires to scientific ideals of rigorous and systematic formulation of
hypotheses which can be empirically evaluated.
Throughout the course, we will emphasize the cyclical relationship
between theory and research. In the
context of a course in developmental psychology, the goal of critical thinking
has several subgoals: a) compare and
contrast different theoretical approaches, b) derive testable hypotheses or
empirical consequences of theory, c) understand research methodology, d) become
familiar with quantitative methods used by the discipline, e) summarize
available empirical evidence on issues, and f) draw appropriate theoretical
conclusions from empirical evidence.
Exams
will emphasize goals that go beyond knowing definitions and examples of
terms. As a consumer of information
about child development, you will need to be able to understand argumentation
methods including research methodology, evaluate empirical and other reasoned
evidence and draw appropriate conclusions.
The “Final Portfolio: Critical Thinking about Social Issues” (described
below) will allow you to practice these skills on real-world sample
articles.
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Understanding contexts. The biosocial context has a pervasive
influence on development. Nature and
nurture are inextricably intertwined.
Throughout the course, we will emphasize ways in which the physical and
social environments affect development.
Social contexts include social categories such as culture, ethnicity and
gender, as well as historical era. And,
of course, in development, age itself is a powerful context—it is related to
many aspects of our physical abilities and resulting environment, as well as
the social settings in which we participate (e.g., daycare vs. school). A recurring theme of this course is the idea
of multiple determinants of behavior—that is, some factors may influence
behavior or development only in certain circumstances—another example of
the influence of contexts.
Engaging with peers. Each of you bring unique interests,
experiences and backgrounds to this course, and consequently can offer a
valuable perspective on development. I
hope that you will participate in small and large group discussions throughout
the semester. In addition, you will
present to the class a brief summary of an article during one class
period. This may be done as part of a
partnership with another student.
Reflecting and Acting. The discipline of developmental psychology
aspires to provide knowledge that will help serve the needs of children. Throughout the course, we will indicate
practical applications of the information we have gained about factors which
influence developmental change. The
“Final Portfolio on Critical thinking on Social Issues” to be described below,
is meant to help you focus on a controversial issue about factors that affect
the welfare of children, and to take a reasoned position on this issue after
evaluating information from both sides.
Class
Activities and Assignments
Relationship between book and class
period. Our own cognitive growth is best facilitated in a spirit of
cooperation. Each of us will benefit
from the active involvement of others.
This involvement will require considerable preparation and willingness
to engage ourselves thoughtfully with ideas presented both in the reading and
other class members. It is important
that you read all the material carefully and thoughtfully in advance of the
discussions on a given topic. Discussion
suffers if the participants are not prepared. “Preparation checks” will allow
you to show that you have familiarized yourself in advance with the readings on
upcoming topics.
The textbook and class periods
are complementary parts of a total learning experience for you. The textbook provides background and details
on a much wider scope than is possible during class time. Class periods will focus on central issues
from the text, sometimes by means of lecture but also through structured peer
learning activities. Exams will evaluate
BOTH how well you have learned the breadth of information available in your
text, and whether you have been actively involved in applying the concepts
through class activities.
Attendance
and Preparation Checks. In a
discussion oriented class, your presence and involvement is critical. The class discussion will suffer if students
are not prepared by having familiarized themselves with the article. In addition to the Overview and Focus
questions in your book that accompany each article, additional Overview and
Focus questions for articles not in the book will be posted on Blackboard
website, listing learning objectives for you to focus on in each article. These
questions are meant to help you summarize key ideas from the articles. Each class period when there are readings
due, you will be asked to bring with you to class a paragraph-length response
(50-150 words) to ONE of the overview questions for EACH article
assigned for that day. In other words, some days you will be writing two
paragraphs (each 50-150 words), and others only one. I strongly prefer that these be
word-processed. Since the purpose of the
assignment is to be prepared for class discussion, NO LATE OR MAKE-UP PREP
CHECKS WILL BE ACCEPTED FOR ANY REASON WHATSOEVER. These will be graded simply
as “satisfactory/unsatisfactory.” Only
18 of these prep checks count in your grade (total 10% of your grade). If you complete additional prep checks, you
may earn up to 2% of your total course grade as extra credit. As with all written work, these must be
in your own words.
Final Portfolio: Critical Thinking about Social Issues. The Critical Thinking about Social Issues
portfolio is intended to help you practice skills in evaluating a secondary
source about developmental psychology.
This assignment is meant to help you focus on a controversial issue
about how factors affect the welfare of children. Examples include: should teachers ban superhero play by
preschoolers? You will be asked to
summarize arguments from both sides and to take a position on this issue, both
before and after class discussion on the topic.
Further details will be provided and posted on Blackboard. You will be handing in components of this
over the semester; the completed portfolio will serve as your final exam. This assignment will be worth 10% of your
total course grade. Late policy:
These papers will be accepted without penalty until 5:00 p.m. on the assigned
day, but each day thereafter will be subject to an accumulating 10% penalty per
day.
Article summary presentation. Each of you will give a short presentation on
one of the articles in the readings from electronic reserve. See Presentation Guidelines that will be
posted on Blackboard. This may be done
individually or as a team. In all cases,
when more than one student is assigned to an article, they must hand in on the
day of their presentation, a written statement, signed by both of them about
their division of labor (see details below).
This involves a written component and an oral component, equally
weighted:
Written: You
should plan to make a handout (no more than front and back of one page, 1”
margins, single-spaced, no smaller than 10 point font) responding to the
overview questions for your article. YOU
MUST SUBMIT YOUR HANDOUT TO ME A WEEK IN ADVANCE OF YOUR PRESENTATION, SO THAT
I CAN CHECK IT OVER FOR ACCURACY. If you
do not do so, or you do not make necessary changes before giving it to the
class, you will lose all the points for preparing a handout. If you hand it in late (after 5 pm of the
day a week before your presentation) you will lose half of the points for the
written component.
Oral: Each
person should plan to give a short (no more than 10 minutes) oral summary of
the key points of the article, responding to the overview questions. Your peers will evaluate the oral component,
based on qualities such as organization, clarity, and responsiveness to
class. You do not have to write a prep check for the session(s) you facilitate. If you (for documented reasons) are unable to
come to class on the day of your presentation, you may make arrangements to
present it later for half-credit.
Division of labor: If
there is more than one student assigned to an article, on the day of the
presentation, you must turn in a statement, signed by both of you, about your
division of labor. A number of
arrangements are possible, e.g., 1) the team decides to divide the questions
for the reading between them and each write and present half of them (since
they are working independently, each will have a separate handout), or 2) the
team agrees to each read the entire article, draft answers to all the
questions, meet jointly to compare answers and decide which answers are best
and how to revise (since they are working jointly, there will be one
handout). It is up to the team to decide
what division of labor they will undertake, but you must present a description
of it, and both students must assent in writing that they believe that this
arrangement was equitable.
Exams. There will be 3 in-class exams, each covering
approximately one-third of the course material.
Exams will be equally weighted and will count for 70% of your course
grade. These will be closely related to
issues highlighted by the overview and focus questions about the articles, but
will also include materials, activities, and discussions in class. Exams will be made up of a combination of
formats, including, but not limited to: multiple choice, matching,
fill-in-the-blank, true-false, graphing, crossword puzzles, and
short-answer. Sample exams will be made
available.
The
handouts from peer presentations, and your own prep checks, will help support
your review of the articles. I will have
checked them over for major inaccuracies, but minor ones may be inadvertently
overlooked. Furthermore, they do not address the focus questions, and exam
questions will address both focus and overview questions. It is your responsibility to review the
articles yourself in studying for the exam.
If for
documented reasons you must miss an exam, you must contact me PRIOR to the exam
to arrange a make-up. All make-ups must
be taken within 5 days of the scheduled exam.
Exam
grades. On each exam, the best two
scores will be averaged. This average will be the top of the curve for that
exam (provided that this average is at least 95% of the original points
possible. For example, if there were 50
questions possible on an exam, if the
best two scores were 48 and 49, their average is 48.5 (97% of the original
total), so 48.5 will be the top of the curve.
If there were 50 questions possible and the best two scores were 45 and
46, their average is less than 47.5 (95% of the original), so 47.5 would serve
as the top of the curve. Your score is
recorded as a percentage of the top of the curve for that exam. Because the top of the curve is determined by
the best performance of your peers, there will be no items thrown out from the
exam. If an item is bad, it will be
missed by the best students and consequently not counted against you.
Outside of class. If you have questions or problems that are
not answered in class, please come see me during office hours. If you cannot come at that time, please make
an appointment so that I will be able to set aside that time for you. If you have a documented learning disability
or other need for educational accommodations, please see me as soon as possible
to discuss these.
Overall course grades Total grades will be rounded to the nearest whole number
and assigned according to the following scale: