Welcome to Educational Psychology Dr. Huxtable Today’s handouts: 1. Syllabus Today’s agenda: 1. Review syllabus in detail 2. Introduction to Ed Psych Why are we here? What kinds of questions will this course help you to answer? What kinds of skills will you develop? Journals Process of Reflection: 1. what happened? 2. why did it happen? 3. what does it mean? 4. where do we go from here? Introduction to Educational Psychology What is our focus? Four inter-related concerns: Student characteristics Teachers—hidden agenda Teaching strategies Subject matter Teachers influence students in powerful, lasting ways, often without even realizing it. Therefore, we must be thoughtful about all of the decisions we make. Characteristics of effective expert teachers 1. have richer and more elaborate categories for understanding problems in teaching 2. work from integrated sets of principles instead of dealing with each new event as a new problem (lengthy decision process) 3. have a sense of what is typical in classrooms (e.g., planning for transitions) 4. have knowledge that is solid and thoroughly developed 5. have mastered a number of moves/routines without thinking If we know good teaching when we see it, why do we need educational psychology? Isn’t this all just common sense? (No!) Teaching is both an art and a science Because you are college students, each of you already has a great deal of valuable knowledge regarding college teaching. That knowledge is important, but it is also incomplete and problematic. As students you've observed what goes on in classrooms, how teachers act and interact, and various learning activities and course structures. However, even if you've been very attentive what you've experienced is only half the story. What you haven't seen is the planning, the informed choice-making, and the reasoning that underpins all good teaching. If you take this time to examine what you already know about teaching you will probably find that you know a lot about "how" teaching is done, and what you need to discover is "why". 1. It is a mistake to rely only on your own experiences as a student as a guide for how to teach. You have to look at the literature to find better ways of doing things. 2. There is no single "good" way of teaching. There are many ways and the good teacher learns to judge which method works best for a particular situation. A teacher needs to care if his or her students learn, respect them and the knowledge and experience they bring to the classroom, be responsive to their needs, and compassionate with regard to their struggles. Research helps us to understand and improve teaching. In your textbook, be sure to pay attention to the difference between theories and principles. Also be sure to understand pedagogical content knowledge. We need to be able to understand what different kinds of research can tell us. Why do we need research? www.whatworks.gov Why do we need research? Common sense Introspection Anecdotal evidence Some terminology: Variable Constant Control Independent variable—manipulated variable Dependent variable—outcome variable Confounding variables Types of studies: Descriptive—measure pre-existing variables Correlational—measure pre-existing variables, then analyze results to identify whether or not they are related Experimental—manipulate independent variable, control all other variables, measure outcome in dependent variable Let’s consider, as an example, some research on elaboration, a learning strategy whereby students add the things they already know to new information as a way of learning the information. Correlational studies—Experimental studies Why, then, don’t we simply do all experimental studies all of the time?
