PSYC510 - Lifespan Development

After successful completion of PSYC510 students will have:

1. Appraised seminal and contemporary constructs of biological, cognitive, social and emotional development across the human lifespan
2. Examined how family, peers, environment, and culture influence and are influenced by individual development
3. Evaluated strategies for facilitation of optimum development across the lifespan
4. Examined models of abnormal development across the lifespan
5. Compared individual and cultural influences on aging, dying, death, grief and loss
6. Applied APA style formatting and writing skills appropriate for graduate level written work

COURSE ASSIGNMENTS

Forum Discussions:
Due Weeks 1 through 8
Weekly course relevant dialogs with classmates and the course instructor will be based on engagement with assigned course readings and/or related multi-media and will take place in the online classroom on designated discussion forums. A set of instructions for each dialog will be posted by the course instructor. While designed to promote lively discourse within a community of fellow learners, the dialogs are academic in nature, graded and require a scholarly orientation. Replying to classmates’ posts is required in order to ensure dialog within an interactive learning setting.

ASSIGNMENTS:

Due Weeks 1, 3, 5 and 8

During Week One, students will complete a brief paper outlining their previous experience with developmental psychology and their goals for the course. In Weeks 3, 5, and 8, students will complete worksheets demonstrating their knowledge regarding their understanding of course material (five brief essay questions per worksheet). Instructions and details for these assignments are located on the classroom Assignments page.

Applied developmental project:

Due Week 6
Students will develop a Power Point presentation, narrated slideshow, or video diary (e.g., “vlog”) discussing their own original proposed experimental study in developmental psychology. Students will choose a topic of interest related to social psychology, identify the population to be studied, discuss the method proposed to recruit subjects, outline their hypotheses to be tested, and explain the methodology used to test hypotheses. Instructions and details for this assignment are located on the classroom Assignments page.