Child Psychology

The course is designed for study by distance learning at work or at home. You receive course manual, assignments and study guide plus tutor support by mail and email. You can start at any time and plan your studies over a period of up to one year from the time of enrolment.

Assessment

Each element is followed by a written assignment, which is submitted and then marked by your tutor. There is no external examination required.

Course Duration

You may register at any time and have a full year to complete your studies. The course will take around 90 hours of study to complete

Course offered by

The Distance Learning Partnership Accreditation This course is accredited by NCFE and is equivalent to Level 3 on the National Qualifications Framework.
NCFE is recognised as by the Office of the Qualifications & Exams Regulator (Ofqual) in England, DCELLS in Wales and CCEA in N Ireland. The course is provided in conjunction with Kendal Publishing Ltd which is a licensed NCFE centre.

Course Contents

Your study pack is dispatched in full at the time of enrolment and provides all you need to complete your studies:

• Study guide
• Comprehensive study notes for each element of the course
• Self-assessment activities
• Assignments
• Tutor support
• Assignment marking & feedback
• Certification

Course Outline

Major Developmental Issues

1. The First Year of Life
Infant reflexes; Social development during the first year of life including the social smile and onset of fear of strangers.

2. The Formation of Attachments
Imprinting; Attachment (Bowlby) including cross-cultural studies; Harlow and surrogate mothers; Relevance of animal studies in child development.

3.Consequences of Breakdowns in Attachments
Maternal deprivation; Implications of theories of attachment and maternal deprivation when placing children with surrogates.

4. The Home, Family and School
Group vs family care and studies of effects of maternal employment and father absent families; Importance of peers and siblings.

5. Basic Principles of Research Methods
Nature and purpose of research, what is an experiment, supporting and refuting hypotheses, independent and dependent variables, control of variables, standardised instructions and procedures, methods of sampling, design of investigations.

6.The Development of Visual Perception
Introduction to the nature/nurture debate on visual perception; Fantz - form perception; Gibson and Walk - depth perception; how the physiology of the human visual system helps us judge depth and distance; Bower - size constancy; animal experiments on early sensory deprivation.

7.The Development of Language and Communication
Development of non-verbal communication in humans, gestures etc; comparisons with non-human primates; outline of language development in humans; including naturalistic observational in humans; including naturalistic observational studies and criticisms of these; Innate and reinforcement theories.

8.Intelligence and Intelligence Testing
Definitions of intelligence; mental age and IQ; Tests of intelligence; Advantages and disadvantages of IQ testing.

9.The Nature/Nurture Debate in the Study of Intelligence
Twins studies; stability of IQ; Are early experiences decisive for later development?

10.Data Collection and Interpretation
Tables and histograms, correlation and scattergrams; Mean; Range; Drawing conclusions from data.

The Child as an Individual

11.How Children Think
Piaget's theory of cognitive development; including studies of egocentrism and criticisms of his work.

12.Learning Theory - How Behaviour is Acquired
Learning and conditioning - classical conditioning and operant conditioning; including explanations of extinction, discrimination and generalisation; positive and negative reinforcement; Social Learning Theory and criticisms.

13.Freud's Psychodynamic Theory - An Alternative Approach
Personality structure, 5 stage theory, criticisms.

14.Moral Development
Definition in psychological terms; investigation of moral behaviour, moral feelings and moral judgement.

15.The Development of Gender Roles
Sex-typing; Gender identity; Biological, social and cultural theories.

16.Aggression in Children
Biological basis of aggression; Psychological theory and aggression; Aggression as a learned response;
Imitation of aggression; viewing violence; Punishment for aggression; sex differences in aggression.

17.Methods Used in Child Development Research
Observational, Survey, Correlational, Experimental - advantages and disadvantages.

18.Play
The importance of play to learning; Piaget's theory of play; forms of play; Relevance of psychological theories to pre-school education; Play and learning in nursery schools; Play therapy.

19.Learning in School
Programmed learning and its relationship to learning theory - advantages and disadvantages; Discovery learning and its effectiveness.

20.Behaviour Modification
Explanation and examples; Relationship to learning theory; Points systems, Advantages and disadvantages.