PSYCH 241
Developmental Psychology, spring 2022 (junior year)
Course Description
This course helps students better understand human development from the moment of conception and across the life span. The course focuses on biological and environmental factors that shape human development. Major changes in physical, cognitive, personality and social development are discussed.
Course Content
Rationale
From my original proposal: A large part of child development entails language acquisition and the composition of a mental grammar. This course also discusses external factors that may influence the behavior of a child, and therefore their speech production and habits.
Learning Goals Assignment
This assignment, which we returned to periodically throughout the semester, allowed us to reflect on our goals for this class and what our main takeaways were. The document with my learning goals and reflection is linked below, with dates throughout the semester that I updated my writing.
Special Topic Papers
The special topic papers connected our readings and learning in class to our real-life experiences. The first special topic covered a 2020 report entitled “America’s Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being”, while the second special topic discussed the contexts of learning on the level of the individual child. Both special topic papers are linked here.
Takeaways
I learned a lot about normal development in children and how to support them throughout key developmental periods, including in the domain of language development. I also found that adult development is relevant in that language use can change throughout the entire lifetime, not just during childhood. These lessons were important in considering how people of all ages develop and use both first and second languages.
Connections
This course connected the most to the education courses I took in my studies, in particular EDUC 250 (Second Language Acquisition), EDUC 295 (Foundations of Teaching), EDUC 245 (Teaching and Learning English Grammar), and EDUC 270 (Exploring Teaching), in their research-based approach to education and learning in children. EDUC 250 focused heavily on language acquisition processes, which this course touched on. The page for EDUC 250 is linked below, and information about the other education courses can be found on the other courses page.