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Class Schedule
TIME OF CLASS: Mondays, Wednesdays 7:00-8:45
p.m. PLACE: Nat Sci Annex Room 102
TIME OF PRACTICUM: Group I -- Tuesdays and
Thursdays, 3:15-5:30 p.m.; Group II - Wednesdays and Fridays,
3:15-5:30 p.m. PLACE: Barrios Unidos (313 Front
Street [nearby Laurel street]; bus stop "Bus Depo")
First class meeting: September 30 (Mon) Last class meeting: December 4 (Wed)
Instructor will be out of town for a conference: November 6 (Wed) -- guest speaker will be announced.
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Info about Instructor, Teaching Assistants, & Office Hours
INSTRUCTOR: Eugene Matusov, Ph. D.
(postdoctoral fellow in psychology)
For more info about the Instructor see Eugene Matusov's Home
Web Page
Office: Soc. Sci. II, Room#305 Phone:
x5180 e-mail: ematusov@cats.ucsc.edu
Office hours:11:00AM -- noon, Tuesdays
TEACHING ASSISTANT: Pablo Chavajay, M.S.
(graduate student in psychology)
Office: Soc. Sci. II, Room#419 e-mail:
pacha@cats.ucsc.edu
Office hours: 2-3 pm, Mondays
TEACHING ASSISTANT: Ed Lopez, M.S. (graduate
student in psychology)
Office: Soc. Sci. II, Room#201 e-mail:
purpleh@cats.ucsc.edu
Office hours: 12-1 pm, Mondays
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Overview:
The core 5 questions
In this seminar, we will draw upon psychological theory,
empirical research, field experience, writing field notes, and students' own beliefs
about learning to explore different modes and models of child
development. Attached to the course is a required 2-unit practicum where students work with
children in an informal computer-learning lab at Barrios
Unidos, a local community-based program for Spanish/English
bilingual youth. The readings and
projects of the seminar, resulting in writing two
final papers, are designed to facilitate the integration of
these experiences with academic knowledge. We expect that the
format of class discussions will vary and may involve the entire
class, Web site, small group, and peers. Discussion of readings
will be based on small group discussions because we do not expect
each student to read all assigned papers -- brief sharing of
readings in small groups is critical for the class.
The seminar is organized around five core
questions:
1. How do we know that children are learning?
2. What could children learn from computers and computers games?
3. What's the difference between school-based learning and everyday learning?
4. What's the difference between learning alone and learning as part of a cultural community of practice?
5. What's the best environment to promote learning?
The seminar will spend two weeks of the course focusing on each question. We will read primary source material drawn primarily from psychology journals, but also incorporating related material from education, anthropology, sociology, and computer science. In-class discussions will focus on identifying the key concepts for the weekly reading and relating those concepts to the students' ongoing field work. Although we will focus on the questions individually, seminar discussions around each question will deepen our understanding of a shared set of conceptual issues involving the evidence of learning, the content of learning, the goals of learning, the cultural context of learning, and the promise of emerging computer technologies to facilitate child development.
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Practicum:
Visiting the Barrios Unidos site
Class will be divided into two groups, each
of which will have its own Teaching Assistant throughout the
class. Twice a week each group will work with children at
Barrios Unidos for one and a half hours and then will have
a 30-minute debriefing, during which you are going to
share your impressions and concerns and will create a list of
issues that your group will bring for the entire class. (see Purposes & Expectations: Participation
in field observations, debriefing, and helping children at the
site).
Here is your work schedule at the site:
3:15 p.m. your arrival at Barrios Unidos
3:15-3:30 p.m. organizational meeting with the Site Coordinator
3:30 p.m. children arrive
3:30-5:00 p.m. helping children with their activities
5:00-5:30 p.m. debriefing
5:30 p.m. you leave the site
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Description of your interests. (1 page, max.; DUE 10/4 Fri, by
7:00 pm)
Describe the reasons why you are taking the course and what you
would like to get out of it. The following questions may guide
your writing. Everyone should include the first question in your
response. However, you may chose whether you want to respond to
the remaining questions listed or to include other issues as you
wish.
The purpose of the assignment is to facilitate your thinking about your expectations, learning needs, and demands for the course in order to make your own learning more meaningful and self-directive and to make the class more productive for everybody. The assignment also will help to make and design your final evaluation (see Purposes & Expectations: Participating in development of the class evaluation Web page that may help you to think through the issues).
Please, use Post Discussion Message page for submitting your paper. Put "First week's assignment" in the subject of your message.
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Writing field notes
Within 24 hours of visiting the Barrios Unidos
site, students will write and publish their field notes formatted
by our template on our class Web. For
more info about goals and expectations about writing field notes,
please, visit the Purposes &
Expectations: Participation in writing Field Notes page.
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Readings
There is a required reader composed of primary source
material. Articles are drawn from edited professional volumes as
well as developmental, cognitive, and educational psychology
journals. In addition to psychology research articles, we will
also cover the work of sociologists, anthropologists, and
computer scientists who have explored issues relevant to
interactions between technology and human development. Each
assigned reading is accompanied with info about:
We expect you to read minimal readings indicated in the parentheses below.
Because we do not expect that you read all assigned papers, we are going to discuss reading in the three following phases in class:
Week 1-2. 09/30-10/09 Readings due
October 7 (read at least any two of the following
papers)
Topic 1. How to help children learn? What is philosophy
of teaching and learning? What is evidence of learning within
each educational philosophy? What is a community of learners?
Rationale for the topic: We anticipate that in the first few weeks, you will be concerned about how to provide help to children at Barrios Unidos. Also the readings will introduce notions of cultural diversity (Moll), non-school learning (Matusov), innovative schooling (Rogoff; Moll), intrinsic motivation (Rogoff; Voss), and discussion of evidence and assessment of learning (Rogoff; Matusov).
Week 3. 10/14-10/16 Readings due
October 14 (read at least any two of the following
papers)
Topic 2. How to find evidence of learning through writing
and analyzing field notes? How to write field notes?
Rationale for the topic: Although we plan to provide some guidance about how to write field notes in class starting from the first week, we anticipate that this issue for you will be important perhaps throughout the first part of the quarter.
Week 4-5. 10/21-10/30
Readings due October 21 (part I; read
at least any two of the following papers).
Topic 3. How can computers and technology contribute to
children's learning?
Rationale for the topic: After you have settled down in the class and at Barrios Unidos a bit, we think you will be ready to start considering the role of technology in learning. We also want you to focus on issues of cultural diversity (DeVillar), innovative schooling (Campione), and informal learning settings (Allen).
Due October 28 (part II below; read at least any two of the following papers)
Week 6-7. 11/04-11/13
Readings due November 4 (part
I; read at least any two of the following papers).
Topic 4. What are cultural, gender, institutional, and
individual differences and similarities in how and what people
learn? What are differences and similarities in trajectories of
individual development? How do verbal and non-verbal
communication contribute to learning? How does institutional
environment define learning and its sustainability?
Rationale for the topic: In the second part of the quarter, we want you to focus on different psychological phenomena related to learning: cultural diversity, verbal and non-verbal communication, gender differences, language.
Due November 11 (part II below; read at least one paper)
Week 8-9. 11/18-11/27.
Readings due November 18 (part I;
read at least one paper).
Topic 5. How can learning and development be
conceptualized? What is relationship between learning and
development? How does informal and everyday learning differ from
traditional school learning?
Rationale for the topic: We expect you to be working on your final research papers these weeks, so we suggest you to read the following theoretical and conceptual papers on the relationship between learning and development, a sociocultural approach to studying development, the notions of ZPD and leading activities, and the concept of situated cognition.
Due November 25 (part II below; read at least one paper)
Please, let us know if the order and the content of the topics meet your needs, so we can adjust them as we go and/or change for the next time we teach this class (see Purposes & Expectations: Reading the assigned literature).
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Two final papers
Reflection on children's learning. In one
3-4-page single-spaced research paper students will integrate field note data with conceptual issues from
readings and in-class discussions to answer a developmental
research question about children's learning. The process of
developing students' individual research interests will be
ongoing throughout the course and, where appropriate, will be
integrated into in-class activities. You can work with peers on
one combined paper under one title -- the size of the combined
paper should be 6-7 single-spaced pages.
Reflection on student's learning. In a separate 2-3-page
single-spaced research paper, students will reflect upon their
OWN learning processes throughout the course. Once again they
will draw upon field notes and course readings, but the questions
will focus on their own development: How has learning occurred in
your own theories about learning? What have you learned from the
children and what have you taught the children? What have you
learned from the other members of the seminar and what have you
taught them? (Members of the seminar, of course, include the
instructors as well as the other students.) What does teaching
have to do with learning?
Both papers should have abstracts of about 150-words.
Working on final research projects will take several steps:
For further requirements and formats see Purposes & Expectations: Writing the final papers.
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Evaluation will be based on two research papers and each student's active participation in seminar and practicum activities.
There won't be a final exam.
The final evaluation will include abstracts from two final papers and a paragraph from field notes representing student's work selected by the student. The abstracts and the paragraph are due December 13 by 5:00 p.m. Send them to your TA via e-mail. The narrative format of the final class evaluation will be discussed in the class -- this discussion is considered to be a part of the course curriculum (see Purposes & Expectations: Participating in development of the class evaluation).
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Feedback
on the class
In addition to the traditional University evaluation at
the end of the class, we really want your
regular feedback on the class so we can improve it down the road.
So we want to ask you to fill out biweekly
feedback survey forms every even Saturday of the month. The reports of the feedback will be
prepared timely and published on our class Web. We also plan to
discuss them in the class. You are also welcome to send your
questions, comments, and/or suggestions via e-mail or raise them
during the class or office hours. We appreciate your help and
partnership in running the class and making it comfortable and
meaningful for every member (see Purposes & Expectations: Filling out the
biweekly feedback surveys).
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Estimated class workload
per week
Below is our rough estimation of students' workload per week (in
hours) (we averaged time if work does not occur every week):
| Type of students' engagement | Time |
Working with children (twice a week) |
3.0 |
| Debriefing on the site (twice a week) | 1.0 |
| Transportation to and from the site* (twice a week) | 1.0 |
Writing your own field notes (twice a week plus revisions) |
3.5 |
| Reading and commenting on other students' field notes | 3.5 |
| Participating in Web discussions | 2.0 |
Reading for the class (40-50 pages per week) |
2.0 |
| Preparing for the final papers (on "average") | 1.0 |
Attending classes (twice a week) |
3.5 |
| Visiting Instructor and TA in their office hours (on "average") | 1.0 |
| Total: | 21.5 |
* Note: this type should not be counted as coursework.
Your biweekly feedback will probably help us to correct some
of these numbers.
According to the guidelines of UCSC CEP (Committee on Educational
Policy), 5 credit hours represent 3-3.5 hours of classwork plus
about 12 hours of preparation; 2 credit hours represent 2 hours
of classwork and about 4 hours of preparation. This totals about
21.5.
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