Social and Personality Development · Psychology
very little but the reading. 2 papers. exams take a lot of memorizing. try to work in groups. makes a bif diff.
2 papers (make sure you follow that paper referencing guide!). A midterm and final which are essay questions and she gives you a study guide. She says they're short answer essays but don't be fooled! If you want all the points, you're going to need to write a lot and get down almost everything she went over in class. She is *very* thorough.
take this class. she is amazing. a lovely person who truely wants to help you to do well. she does not work full time at cu, so she actually makes phone appointments in order to talk to you about your papers. also, it was an easier class, and the information seems easy. the lectures are really a recap of the reading from the previous night, so lectures are not that important to go to. you may think that it is easy until you get the exam back and notice that when you thought that you knew the info perfectly, she was looking for specific words. crazy grader, but easy information. the exams are essay questions that you mainly have before the exam, but memorize memorize memorize. she will be a stickler for specifics
Dweck is a great person, very nice, warm, and helpful. Unfortunately I took her class, partially based on her great reviews, and did NOT enjoy it. The tests are a pain in the ass because you literally have to memorize everything verbatim and spit it back exactly. Due her testing style is NOT at all stimulating, I found that although I went to every class and did all the readings...I learned NOTHING! The material is quite obvious, almost to the point of absurdity. Yes, spending time with you kid is probably good for their development. There are many nuanced theories, which while learning seemed mildly interesting, but looking back on the course, I cannot say that I learned one thing. If you are capable of memorization you will do wonderfully in the course...don't skip any classes because she wants you to regurgitate much of her lectures on the test. While I did get an A, I would not recommend the course unless you are fanatically interested in child development to the point where you do not mind listening to the same exact thing over and over again.
Beware. The course material is honestly not very difficult at all and Stacey is a fairly good lecturer (if not a bit like an elementary school teacher with her obvious answer questions that would throw everybody off since we're not used to that here). She does make the material abundantly clear so that chances are you will find that you totally understand the concepts (provided that you go to class OR do the readings, which are also pretty straightforward). Sometimes she overdoes it with the review of what we learned last class in the next class (which is quite useful when you do skip a class/reading or few) but your difficulty will not be in understanding the material, but in trying to understand what in the world she wants or expects from your papers. She will take a whole hour out of the class to go over the assignment and clarify her expectations, which on the surface seem simple enough. However, when you get your grade back chances are you won't be happy and it's because, as the other reviewer pointed out, the TAs are really strict on what they expect. When I went over my paper with the TA, the rubric they were supposed to adhere to was so strict and detailed--which was annoying considering the papers are not allowed to be very long AND there's a penalty for going over the length. In a way, she over complicates things with diagrams and such in her notes which are not real…
Two papers (easy if you at least print out the articles), midterm and final. She gives review sheets with all possible 5-6 essay topics. She picks from those and simplifies the questions. Take the class!
If you have any interest in this class, take it! Lutz knows her stuff. She explains everything to the best of her ability, even though some arrogant/ talkative students always had something to argue about. The two papers, that are graded by the TAs, are fair. Although you don't have to read everything assigned, she starts to pick up on it when she asks questions that you should know the answers to (from the readings). For the most part the readings are good but skip the really really big ones (if you need them for the paper later on you can just you the bullets to read the specific section). The only problem I had was that if someone was talking, if you dropped a pencil or if you itched your nose she saw it. Not only would she catch every movement but she would stop herself mid-sentence to ask them to please stop. She's cute but after a while it is distracting to the other 80+ students trying to listen to her lecture.
I agree with the other reviewers who said that the class was interesting and informative; I reslly enjoyed it. I just have a tip to future students: on the tests, you will be expected to answer 8 short answer questions with exact terminology, precision and thoroughness. Memorize, memorize, memorize, and you can get an A. It's all spit-back - no one is loking for you to be inventive or creative.
Two papers, a midterm, and a final. The papers are focused on comparative readings, the midterms and final are essay-style. If you go to class, do the readings, and think critically this is an easy and enjoyable class.
Three short-answer tests: two "mid-terms" and one "final" but it only covers the last third of the course. You must study for the tests but it is clear what to study. Textbook is moderately interesting.