Resource manual for new teachers of high school psychology

I'm very pleased to share this new resource for high school psychology teachers! The APA's Emily Leary Chesnes, who works with the board of TOPSS (Teachers of Psychology in the Secondary Schools), announced today that the TOPSS-created Resource Manual for New Teachers of High School Psychology has been released.

As you can see in the image above, the manual covers lesson plans, activities, resources, textbook selection and more. You can view it page-by-page online, or download the entire manual as a PDF Please check it out and let me know what you think!

As you'll notice on the acknowledgements page I was one of the authors, along with Jeanne Blakeslee, Nancy Fenton, Jann Longman, Katherine Minter, Kimberly Patterson and Janie Wilson, but I would like to give one major shout-out to Will Elmhorst who had the vision for this manual and initiated the creation of it a few years ago. The other major shout-out, of course, goes to Emily Leary Chesnes for keeping us all focused and motivated to get it completed!

--posted by Steve

Thinking about psychology on summer vacation

 QUICK NOTE: I'm happy to introduce Nancy Diehl who is joining THSP as a moderator. Nancy will introduce herself in her first post below.  --Steve

Thinking about psychology on summer vacation?

Quick resource reminder: Scientific American Mind gives one minute summaries of recent relevant research.  Enough to touch your curiosity enough to find out more. My favorite recent one was called "Confusion Helps us Learn."

I wanted to submit this post prior to my 5:30 a.m. departure tomorrow.  We are leading a service learning trip to an orphanage in rural Kranglovear, Cambodia.  We are heading there with two teachers, a few friends, and about 5 students, many of whom are returning to the orphanage for the third time.  On this trip, we'll be living, eating, working and playing at the orphanage with the 24 kids there, building a large garden, hiking, biking and....??  Hoping to take many pictures to cue stories relating to psychological principles... to include in teaching, and then to use as a model for students to do the same to make connections and help make reviewing more fun.

One of the biggest parts of the trip is taking about 10 students from the orphanage to Siem Reap.  This six hour drive is HOURS further away from their village than they've ever been.  They'll visit Angkor Wat, the national treasure that is on the flag of Cambodia, eat in a restaurant for the first time, stay in a hotel for the first time... many firsts!

This post is my first, so a brief introduction.  I was trained as a clinical psychologist and worked in academia for the first ten years of my career.  Then, my family moved from the U.S. to Hong Kong in 2007, and I started teaching AP Psychology at Hong Kong International School. In these five years, we've traveled to many cities in 22 countries, and worked with students from a variety of backgrounds.
--posted by Nancy

Vision explained visually!

XKCD is one of my favorite online comics (check it out!) and the most recent comic is a light-hearted but thorough explanation of the process of vision and visual phenomena. Great example of presenting detailed, technical information in a concise and entertaining way.


posted by Rob McEntarffer