Psych Science and Research Methods

I just realized that creating posts based on the day I taught it isn't necessarily helpful. Hahaha.

So for my fourth day of class, I'm planning to finish up psychology as a science and then have my students work on a worksheet I call "Bringing It All Together".  In this worksheet, students reiterate the steps of the scientific method, fill out a comparison chart for the research methodologies we discussed previously, read an article on texting, and then answer some questions about the article.  I'll post more when I know how much I got through on the last class period.

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So if the PsychPortal Learning Curve activities are any idication, my students are struggling with EVERYTHING.  I don't know if that means they're not reading the book or doing the work (I know quite a few haven't even signed up for PsychPortal yet, so God only knows what they're doing.  I think next week I might try a practice quiz so they can see I'm not joking around about doing work at home.

First, I want to talk to students about what constitutes Science.  I have a handout for them of these characteristics and also for the scientific method (specific to psychology, which includes ethical considerations).  I also want to teach them a little here about ethics.  I should try to limit this to 15 minutes.

For today, I asked students to complete, at home, the PsychSim5 tutorial called "What's Wrong with this Study"? which ocvers different types of research and asks them to identify weaknesses in real research.  I am going to ask them about the different types of research.  After all three are on the board, we will go through some additional information:

Descriptive: observe, measure, describe behavior
  To expand on this, we will discuss CASE STUDIES and NATURALISTIC OBSERVATION.

Correlational: evaluate relationships between variables
   To expand on this, we will discuss SURVEYS and ARCHIVAL RESEARCH.

Experimental: to see the effect of one variable on another
     To expand on this, we will talk about variables, hypotheses, and strengths/weaknesses.

Already I can see this is not going to go well.  Ideally, I want this to take 20 minutes.

Then, I want them to work on the Bringing It All Together worksheet, either solo or in pairs.  I think, realistically, this will take them half an hour or more to complete.  So...if I give them 40 minutes, that leaves only 35 for the things up there I want to do.  Oh this is hilarious.  Good luck, Soicher.