Subject Code/Name:
HPS111 – Introduction to Psychology AWorkload: 1 x 2hr seminar, 1 x 1hr tutorial
Assessment:
- Deconstructed research report (50%)
- Content Roadmap (35%)
- Reflective Practice Journal (15%)
Recorded Lectures: Yes
Past exams available: No exam!! Woohoo!
Textbook Recommendation: Psychology The Science of Mind and Behaviour by Michael W Passer and Ronald E Smith, Australian edn, 2013
This is the prescribed text so it’s better to grab a copy.
Seminar presenter(s)/Lecturer(s): Christian Hyde and Sharon Horwood
Year & Semester of completion: 2013, trimester 1
Rating: 3/5
Your Mark/Grade: pending
Comments:
I have a very mixed feeling about this unit.
First of all, there’s no exam which is great. The unit chair whom is Sharon made the decision of abolishing exams for HPS111 and HPS121. She explained that exam is not an effective means of learning.
Instead of sitting exam, we got to do concept maps like we did in high school. But we have to do this on computer this time. Hence we got to learn new technology skills as well as learning to retain information better. Concept maps are great because they require a deep understanding for a topic before we can make links between concepts.
The 6 topics that we touched on were:
• Biological Bases – Genetics and Brains
• Learning
• Memory
• Intelligence
• Motivation & Emotion
After finishing the concept maps, guess what? You get to mark your own maps!! But you’ve to write up a 500-words justification for the marks you’ve given yourself. Your tutor would have a look at it and decided whether you’ve underestimated or overestimated yourself. They would personally contact you if that happened. If the mark you’ve given yourself is what the tutor seem reasonable, that would be your final result.
These concept maps are valuable resources for yourself later on if you’re going to continue on a psych major. However, there weren’t any sample or one perfect concept map provided by the unit chair. You have to decide for yourself which concepts are important and which are not. Therefore, it’s tricky because you don’t know whether you’ve covered everything. All you were given was a rubric with criteria such as structure, clarity, etc to base your concept maps around.
Tip: although this would be your last assignment to be submitted for this unit, I suggest that you should start to do concept map from WEEK ONE. You have to do 6 different concept maps on 6 different topics. Therefore, it’s extremely important to start doing this as soon as possible because you would be more likely to take tremendous hours to trim your maps. The maps should be in 5 levels with examples at the bottom level.
In deconstructed report, we got to pick one out of six research articles and just deconstructed it. Then we had to create a website on it. The website MUST include pictures/videos or any illustrations that you could find to make your site look pretty. All resources had to be referenced correctly, of course.
Tip: your APA reference should be perfect by now so there wasn’t any excuse to make a mistake. If you need help you should go and see the Drop-in-station, they were a great help to me. Illustrations are important no matter how perfect your deconstructed report is. I found out this in the hard way.
After our reports were marked, we could do peer-review. This was optional. You were randomly divided into a group of five in your tute group. I found this was meaningless because I reviewed other people’s sites but I got none back. It was silly as well because all we did was saying nice things like “Good job, well done, etc” How could these feedback help us improve? I would like to pick my own group in the future rather than being randomly assigned.
The three reflective practice journals were the same as writing a diary but it has to be related to uni/study/psych, of course. After writing an entry you had to put it in a template given by the unit chair. The template was a website. This was a test of getting used to new technology as well.
Tip: This is extremely easy marks but don’t forget to do it right and put it in the right place!
One of the issues I had with this unit was the teaching method. We had seminar instead of traditional lecture. All lectures were pre-recorded and you’re expected to listen to the lectures right before the seminar. This model is followed after the “flipped class” model in the US. Recorded lectures were short, divided in parts and they’re not a substituted for doing the reading! I just couldn’t work with recorded lectures because I found it really hard to concentrate on them. That’s being said, there’re no one checking whether you’ve listened to the lectures and seminar. So you could set your own study pace. None of the lectures and seminars was compulsory, of course.
The main thing to study was to do the reading. There was a little reading guide for each week’s topic. The unit chair did a really great job to stuff up the key objectives with the page numbers in the book. I emailed her and she said the reading guide was not compulsory as well!
As I'm writing this review, I figure that I didn’t even have to travel 1hr and 30 mins to uni at all. All I could have done was staying at home, reading random pages, taking random notes and making random concept maps so I could pass the unit.
In the seminar we’re kind of getting the same info from the recorded lectures but the presenter expand/explain them more. We get to interact with the presenter as well. So if you’ve any question feel free to ask the presenter. That’s being said, first years like me are not that brave to put our hands up and ask questions ><
Seminar and lecture are two completely different things.
In
lecture, you’re supposed to listen, take notes and ask questions after the lecture. Before lecture, you should at least do some reading or skim through it. Sitting in a lecture requires motivation to focus and concentrate.
In
seminar, you’re not supposed to take notes, so don’t expect the presenter to speak or go through the slides slowly. You are encouraged to actively interact with the seminar presenter by asking question during the seminar. You’re expected to finish all the readings (or at least some of it) and listen to the pre-recorded lectures. Seminar requires you to be an active student and be better prepared compare to lecture.
I don’t think tutes are useful because all we just re-confirmed over and over again the same information that we could have checked on CloudDeakin before asking. But I still went to 10/11 of the tutes because I was afraid that there were some helpful advices on the assignment. There weren’t any.
Overall, I don’t know how I should rate this unit because I feel like I haven’t learnt enough but I enjoyed the fact that there was no
exam. I had a few issues with the teaching method as well.