Abstract
Recent years have witnessed a surge in classroom-based pedagogies aimed at targeting student engagement. This paper seeks to report on the design, delivery and small-scale evaluation of a final year undergraduate module in developmental psychology. Adopting a range of innovative teaching/learning methodologies, the author sought to support student engagement across the module. Using a scaffolded approach to module delivery, four discrete teaching methodologies were employed: ‘lectorial’ design, the jigsaw method, in-class presentations and an online discussion forum. Such strategies were chosen due to their strong alignment with the six ‘engagement indices’, as put forward by the Irish Survey of Student Engagement (ISSE). Following module completion, student feedback was obtained using the Student Course Engagement Questionnaire (SCEQ) and additional Likert scale questions. Based on descriptive and inferential analysis of findings, student feedback is presented, with implications for practice outlined. Limitations of the small-scale evaluation are also noted, offering potential avenues for future research.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 375-392 |
| Number of pages | 18 |
| Journal | Psychology Learning and Teaching |
| Volume | 16 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Nov 2017 |
Funding
Siobhán Howard is a lecturer in psychology at Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick. She completed her undergraduate and postgraduate studies at the National University of Ireland, Galway. Dr Howard has published her work widely, in outlets such as Biological Psychology and Psychosomatic Medicine, and regularly presents her research at international conferences. She sits on the board of and is secretary to the International Society for Stress and Anxiety Research (STAR). Dr Howard has received funding from the Irish Health Research Board and the Irish Research Council to support her research. Her teaching interests lie in developing the undergraduate psychology students into competent, independent researchers: critical consumers of scientific knowledge. As such, her teaching responsibilities in psychology have focused on research methods, statistics, project design and dissemination. These overlap significantly with Dr Howard’s research interests in psychology, which have a particular focus on empirical research in health psychology and educational psychology.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Irish Health Research Board | |
| Irish Research Council |
Keywords
- Developmental psychology
- higher education
- scaffolding
- Student Course Engagement Questionnaire
- student engagement