Psych 101 Teaching Demonstrations?

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Hello!

For the psych 101 class I'm going to be TAing I was suggested to come up with some fun and interactive demonstrations or quick experiments to incorporate into my lessons to teach the basic concepts of an intro class. Does any one (maybe some current or past instructors) have any ideas they can share?

Thanks so much!
Psychanator

I can't remember off the top of my head what I used, tho Google was a big help~

This link may help http://www.psychnet-uk.com/x_new_sit...ion/games.html

Will you be sharing yours here ...?

Thanks, I appreciate it!

I'm looking for demonstrations (almost like mini in-class experiments) to demonstrate concepts (including, but not limited to, cognition, visual perception, learning and memory, etc). I'd be grateful if people shared their ideas. If and when I come up with ideas, I'd be happy to share with those interested.

ideas in recent issues of Tof P?
http://teachpsych.org/top/index.php

Originally Posted by psychanator

Thanks, I appreciate it!

I'm looking for demonstrations (almost like mini in-class experiments) to demonstrate concepts (including, but not limited to, cognition, visual perception, learning and memory, etc). I'd be grateful if people shared their ideas. If and when I come up with ideas, I'd be happy to share with those interested.

Stroop is easy to implement in power point and very effective.

There are so many possibilities for doing demonstrations that it is difficult to answer this question.

Generally speaking, I think getting hands-on activity is good when you can. If you are teaching about personality, give them an inventory to take and score. If you are teaching about memory, do some memory tests as a group. If you are teaching about clinical disorders, find some good video case studies. Anything to be multimodal is great, so long as they are also getting a chance to discuss, ask questions, and apply the material in another way later.

Some of the Intro textbooks out there come with tons of suggestions for class activities. Might be a good starting point.

Pop culture stuff can be a big hit. When I was teaching a lesson in a child psychopathology class on parenting teenagers (I know this example dates me) I showed clips from "The Osbornes" reality show about Ozzy and his family which was a current program at the time. It sparked a pretty good discussion about how you define "good" parenting and important attributes in parenting teenagers.

This might not fit for your class, but I also often used articles from Time and Newsweek as jumping off points for discussion. They tend to be interesting and UG's are more likely to read them than their text books.

Published case study books are good. Also I second the ideas about the Stroop and personality inventories. I have used both of those with success.

Best,
Dr. E

Originally Posted by psychanator

Hello!

For the psych 101 class I'm going to be TAing I was suggested to come up with some fun and interactive demonstrations or quick experiments to incorporate into my lessons to teach the basic concepts of an intro class. Does any one (maybe some current or past instructors) have any ideas they can share?

Thanks so much!
Psychanator

You could do something a la Mr. Wizard (Children of the 80's High-Five!!) to demonstrate how the brain interprets visual information. The students may have seen various examples on the internet, but they probably don't know why it happens.

Google turned up these examples: http://www.scientificpsychic.com/graphics/ I didn't read through them, so I'm not vouching for the accuracy of the explanations or the author....but I images are some of the most common illustrations of the underlying science.

I hate to support Reality Tv, but "Intervention" (I think that is the one) actually uses properly applied principles of exposure and response prevention for treatment of OCD. I'm sure there are some YouTube clips about this that may be worth discussing. Phobias are also easy to show via media...for better or worse.

The monkey business illusion is a great in-class demo of selective attention. Short, interactive, and fun. Easily found on YouTube

Originally Posted by Therapist4Chnge

I hate to support Reality Tv, but "Intervention" (I think that is the one) actually uses properly applied principles of exposure and response prevention for treatment of OCD. I'm sure there are some YouTube clips about this that may be worth discussing. Phobias are also easy to show via media...for better or worse.

You must mean the OCD Project. Intervention is about Johnson-model confrontations for substance abuse.

Originally Posted by syzergy

The monkey business illusion is a great in-class demo of selective attention. Short, interactive, and fun. Easily found on YouTube

I love the monkey business illusion -- and so do students!

Here are some links to help the OP:

http://topix.teachpsych.org/w/page/19980993/FrontPage
http://clipsforclass.com/
http://psych.hanover.edu/aps/teaching.html

I also love using pop culture and TV/movie clips. For one example, when discussing parenting styles I showed different clips from TV shows and asked my students to identify which parenting style was being used. They seemed to enjoy it.

Originally Posted by cara susanna

I also love using pop culture and TV/movie clips. For one example, when discussing parenting styles I showed different clips from TV shows and asked my students to identify which parenting style was being used. They seemed to enjoy it.

My favorite to witness is the "Jerry Springer" style...which is to wait to get an audience of friends, family, and random onlookers before dropping some knowledge on the child.