DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
Psychology 336
Fall, 2008
TTh 9:30 to 10:50 in Taper Hall #210
Dr. Kim Lindsey
e-mail address: (This is the best way to contact me. I check my e-mail daily.)
Office: SGM 529
OFFICE HOURS: TTh 1 to 2pm.
You can also make an appointment by e-mailing me (checked daily).
Always, the best way to get hold of me is by e-mail.
USC Blackboard:Your TAs and I will communicate with the class through blackboard. Any changes to the schedules will also be posted on BB. Please make sure you check it a few times a week. TA’s information including office locations and office hours, lecture information, announcements and grades are also posted on BB. Please note that you will be responsible for all information posted on BB.
TAs: Office locations and hours will be posted on Blackboard
Kean Hsu:
Kris Stevens:
DISCUSSION SECTIONS (“Labs”): Please make sure you attend your first scheduled lab section. All the requirements for lab, including the “MyVirtual Child” assignments and lab presentations, will be discussed in detail during the first lab session. You also will need to meetand know your TA is so you can communicate directly with him/her when needed. TAs are responsible for grading quizzes,lab presentations and My Virtual Child assignments.
PREREQUISITE: Psychology 100, equivalent to Psych.100, or instructor’s permission
TEXTBOOK:The World of Children by Cook and Cook(required)
WEBSITES: Please make sure you use the following web site. It is free with the purchase of your book.
This site has many, many helpful resources, including video clips that explain concepts, chapter reviews, practice exams and ways to know your "weak" areas. It also has the entire book on line.
Coursedescription and goals:
The course will cover basic concepts and theories of child and adolescent development. We will cover these topics in five major periods of life: prenatal, infancy (birth through 2), early childhood (3 through 6), middle childhood (7 through 11) and adolescence (12 and beyond). Development will be seen as an individual adaptation to the demands of life that follows a roughly similar course across cultures. However, different patterns can emerge as a function of the child's biological make-up, interactions with the environment, family background and culture. My goal is to give you tools to effectively interact with children and to begin to understand children in different stages of development. During the course of the semester, you will be raising your own “child” on line using principles you will be learning in class and in your readings. I’ll be interested to know how your child turns out!
A major focus of the class will be to take research and theory and apply them in very practical ways to your own personal growth, maturity. If you wish to call this “self-help”, I don’t have a problem! During the course of the semester, we will also look at aspects of pathological development and what can be done to help children and adolescents with serious issues.
Some of you are planning careers in clinical psychology, academic research or in various fields that serve children and adolescents. Others of you plan on being parents some day, or are already parents, and want to learn as much as you can about the healthy (and unhealthy) development of children and adolescents. Others of you may have siblings you’d like to “figure out”! Some of you are simply interested in your own psychological, emotional and physical development. All of these are valid reasons for taking this class. If there are specific issues you are interested in and wish to have addressed, please let me know and I will try to incorporate them in the lectures.
My classes tend to be very interactive. Class discussions on topics presented are the norm and I encourage your comments and concerns.
Reading assignments
The World of Children, but Cook and Cook is a very “user friendly” text. Not all of what is covered in the book will be presented in class, but will be covered on the exam. You will be responsible for keeping up to date with the readings. Preparing for the quizzes will be much easier if you don’t fall behind. Please make sure you have completed the readings before class.
If you want more information on a specific topic, refer to the many suggested readings in the textbook, or search for information using the excellent website/study guide provided for the book by the publisher.“Mydevelopmentlab” provides you with many excellent tools that will help prepare you for exams, including practice exams.
My Virtual Child Website
My Virtual Child helps you experience child development from a parent’s point of view. You and an imaginary partner will raise a “child” on an interactive website from birth to 18 years. More will be explained in lab, but here are the basics. You log on and are told you have a new baby girl or boy. You get to name the child and make choices about how the child will look (hair, eye color and skin tone). You’ll provide information about your personality and cognitive abilities that will be used to construct a virtual child who somewhat resembles your personality. Each child develops differently according to his/her own unique “genetic” profile, environmental “experiences”, and “random” environmental events. You make choices about child rearing issues that affect your child’s behavior. Many concepts from the course are put into practice during the program. The operation of the program is pretty self-explanatory, but your TA will demo it.
You’ll write twelve 3-4-page papers (10 points each) analyzing your child’s development. Instructions for the reports will be provided in a handout with scoring rubrics. You’ll bring a hard copy of your report to Discussion section and it will be scored by a partner and turned in to the TA. After scoring a partner’s report you’ll have a group discussion of issues that came up with your children. The goal of these sessions is for you to experience some of the variety in children’s developmental paths, and discuss how to apply concepts from the course to children’s development. The first two reports can be turned in for re-grading a week later after getting feedback from your scoring partner. If you miss section, you can turn it in the same day at the Psych main desk by 5 PM and have it time-stamped (1 point off for a half-day late paper). We deduct two points per day, including weekends, for late papers. These points are very important to your grade, so make sure you get them in on time.
Discussion Sections and Teaching Assistants
There will be 12 meetings of the discussion sections. We will take roll, and there is a point-earning activity in every section meeting. Attendance and participation is optional, but you should be aware that you can earn up to 36 points by participating in 12 of the sessions.. In addition to My Virtual Child grading and discussion, there are quizzes and concept reviews.
The two TAs are graduate students in Developmental Psychology, and they will be responsible for grading your Virtual Child reports, preparing section activities, assigning you points for the section activities, grading exams, and managing a data base of your scores that you can view on Blackboard.
Teaching Assistants
There will 2 TA for the class. The TAs will be responsible for labs and grading the “Virtual Child” assignments, quizzes and lab presentations. The TA is a graduate student in psychology or neuroscience who has previous experience in this course, or previous experience in developmental psychology. Your TA will have regular office hours two hours per week and by appointment for an additional hour to assist you in studying for exams, as well as the assignments on journal articles. The TA will announce office hours at the first discussion section meeting. See me for questions about lectures during my office hours, or make an appointment.
Quizzes
Quizzes: There will be 3 quizzes taken during the course of the semester and will cover both the material in the textbook as well as my lectures which expand on the book. There will not be a "final". Please note the dates on which exams are scheduled and contact me in advance if you have a problem being there for the exam. You should receive approval from me prior to missing an exam. However, if you become ill or have an emergency shortly before the exam, you can leave a message with the psychology department secretary, Maria, at (213-740-2203). If the illness or emergency was severe enough to prevent you from taking the quiz, I will pro-rate your remaining quizzes. I don’t give make-up quizzes because of the difficulty of constructing a new version of each test. Failure to follow these procedures will result in a "0" on the quiz.
Studying: Preparing for exams should be a process that is spaced out over time, not massed together in a single study session. This is common sense, but also is supported by psychological research! However, it is hard to put into practice, as it takes a lot of self-discipline. The on-line study guide is helpful and you might use it to take practice tests. As you read the text, it is very important to compare the text material to your lecture notes for that topic. This helps you organize the material from both lecture and text into a coherent whole.
Discussion Sections ("labs")
There will be discussion sections each week except for the last week of class. Attendance and participation in these discussion sections is required. You will be raising a child “on line” with “Virtual Child”, and will be discussing this during labs. You will also be doing a presentation in lab that will be graded. Please make sure you attend the first discussion section to get the syllabus for the presentation as well as the papers.
Videos
Videos are used quite often in the class to illustrate child behavior and to promote discussion. If you miss a class in which a video is shown, you should borrow another student’s notes. The videos shown are referred to in the class schedule in italics (e.g., video: The Mind).
Attendance and Participation in Lectures
Please make sure you attend class. Over 50% of the lectures will contain material that is not covered in the text or that expands on the information in the book. I try very hard to make classes informative, applicable to your life experience and hopefully enjoyable! (My theory is if you're awake, you'll remember more! …You're welcome to bring your coffee!) If you have to miss class for some reason, please make sure you get notes from someone who has attended that class. You will be responsible for all material presented in class as well as in the text-book. I will be showing videos quite often that illustrate aspects of child development. These videos will be covered in the exams.
Note: I frequently give extra credit opportunities in class.
Students have found that these EC points can make a substantial difference in their grades.
How much each exam/assignment contributes to the final grade:
Exams (3): 50 multiple-choice questions (worth 2 points each) plus 3 short answer questions (worth 5 points each). Total for each exam: 115 points …………………………………………………….345
“Virtual Child” assignments…………………………………………………………………………..120
Discussion section activities ………………...…………………………………………………….…...36
Total possible points:
Grading scale
Although the final grades and quizzes are not “curved” the grades on the My Virtual Child assignments and presentationswill reflect how well you did compared to the other papers that are turned in.
An A is from 92.5 to 100. An A- is from 89.5 to 92.4. (I round up at 89.5 and at 92.5.) If you get a 92.4, your grade will be an A-. I'm generous in the round ups, so please don't ask that it be rounded up any further. A B- is and 79.5 to 82.4, a B is an 82.5 to an 86.4, a B+ is an 86.5 to an 89.4 of the points, etc. Since I do give several extra credit opportunities during the semester, (and round up!) I will not deviate from this scale. Please make sure you take advantage of the extra credit assignments!! They really make a difference at the end of the semester! Trust me on this!
If you miss a significant amount of material due to illness before week 12 of the class, contact me, or your TA, to arrange make-up assignments. Remember that exams cannot be made up, only pro-rated with a valid excuse. If you miss coursework due to illness after week 12, you may be eligible for an incomplete but you need to see meand fill out an agreement in order to get this approved.
Please come in during office hours or make an appointment to come and talk to me if you are having any problems in the class! I’m here to help you in any way I can, but I can’t do that if I don’t know there is a problem. PLEASE, don’t wait till the last few weeks of class.
Note on Academic Integrity
Students should follow all guidelines about plagiarizing and cheating given out by the http:/ To put it simply, just don't do it!Violations will be punished according to USC rules. If you have questions about academic integrity, consult “SCampus” or two publications by the Office for Student Conduct, entitled “Guide to Avoiding Plagiarism” and “Understanding and Avoiding Academic Dishonesty”found at http:/ They make clear what does and does not constitute plagiarism or cheating.
Note on disability accommodations: Students requesting academic accommodations based on a disability are required to register with Disability Services and Programs (DSP) each semester. A letter of verification for approved accommodations can be obtained from DSP when adequate documentation is filed. Please be sure the documentation is delivered to the Director of Disability Services as early in the semester as possible. DSP is open Monday-Friday 8:30 – 5:00. The office is in Student Union 301 and their phone number is (213) 740-0776.