Report on NCSS, Day Two

[Note from Steve: This is the second of two reports from Arizona psychology teacher Scott Reed about last week's psychology presentations at the National Council for the Social Studies annual convention. If you missed the day one report, please check it out here.]

Reed’s Report of NCSS 2012- Day 2

Saturday also had a strong group of speakers, but did end on a serious note with a report from Randy Ernst to the Psychology Community Meeting.  The CCSSO is an organization that has been working for three years on the plan to incorporate social studies into the Common Core Standards.  They released their initial report, and only history, economics, civics, and geography were mentioned in the report.  Even though psychology fits in very well with the four dimensions of social studies in the report, our subject area was not even mentioned in the six page report.  It is going to be important for teachers and the major organizations (APA, College Board, state boards) to come up with a method to effectively let this group understand the importance of psychological science  to social studies and the development of a well educated student.

Saturday

Keith Ferguson- My Psych Study
If you have been intimidated like myself in having students do class research, check out the PowerPoint and handouts from Matt Ferguson.  He has two pages of links to websites that have online research as well as a list of many of the research projects his students have done.  I highly recommend you look at his resources, it is exactly what I have been looking for.

Catherine Jaquith – Windows to Your Future: Using Psychology Concepts to Strengthen Character
I have been looking forward to Catherine’s presentation on the VIA Institute of Character survey since I met her at the AP reading. My  AP roommate, Todd Dilbeck, also told me about how great this character assessment is for students and a psychology class.  Catherine’s PowerPoint gives many ways to use the VIA in the classroom.

Steve Jones- Not Tacked On: Effectively Incorporating Diversity in Introductory Psychology 
Steve focused on using as many different outlets throughout the course to show diversity without necessarily focusing on diversity.  He really likes the movies Hoop Dreams and Babies (there is nudity in Babies, so pick clips carefully).  To quote Steve, “White people do not need more movies about white people,” when referring to the movie The Breakfast Club.
 
Eric Chudler- Featured speaker -Neuroscience for Kids: Brain Science in the classroom
Dr. Chudler of the site Neuroscience for Kids offered his view on many misconceptions of the brain, as well as some of the legal and moral issues that are going to surround the breakthroughs in brain image technology.  Dr. Chudler also announced that about eight high school teachers and additional students are going to have the opportunity to work in his lab this summer. Get more information about this here.

Technology
I would encourage you to try the site www.polleverywhere.com. I have never wanted to invest the time and money in clickers, but this is a good way to get information from your students through their cell phones.  Charlie Blair-Broeker showed us a great way to use Google Docs to not only gather data, but the program also will take the data and make charts without prompt.

Because of the hard work of the Psychology Community, NCSS is a very worthwhile professional development for a full time psychology teacher or someone who teaches just a few sections.
See you in Saint Louis in 2013!



--posted by Steve