Syllabus for Spring 2006
(Class time: MWF 11-11:50)
Instructor: Dr. Scharff
Office: EDU 215f, Lab: EDU 117c, TEC Office in Library 208H
Hours: M 10-11, T 3:30 -4:30, W 1:30-3:00, TH 1-2, F 10-11 or byappointment
Phone: 468-1415, TEC 468-1831
Email: lscharff@sfasu.edu
TA: Vikki Netterville
Office: ED 256 Hours: tba Email:vikkisny@aol.com
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Here are some links to onlinereferences regarding perception and APA style writing /referencing that might also serve as good resources.
Required Text: Experimental Methodology, 9th Edition ByLarry B. Christensen
Recommended Texts:
Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 5thEd.
*** Psychological Association. Pyrczak, F., & Bruce, R.(2005). Writing empirical research reports: A basic guide forstudents of the social and behavioral sciences (5th ed.). CA: PyrczakPublishing
Some class announcements and assignments will be sent to you viaemail. I will use your titan account that you are assigned throughSFASU. It will be your responsibility to check your email regularly.It is possible to forward your titan account email to another accountif you prefer (e.g. a hotmail account). I will also send Psychologynews updates; these are optional readings unless otherwise noted.
Course Description and Objectives: This course is designedas a capstone to the sequence of courses (PSY 330, 341, and 497) thatprepares our students to successfully enter and complete a graduateprogram. In this course we will cover the complete research process,with an emphasis on the steps to carry out and write up the researchproject proposal you completed in Psy 341. You will also prepare andpresent a poster presentation of your project both to the class andat a departmental research conference. The department will use yourcourse fee to pay for the printing of one poster (36" x 42") for eachof you.
I will expect you to come to class prepared by reviewing theassigned material and completing any assignments due that day. Inclass we will discuss the material, and you will be expected toparticipate in the discussions and activities. As part of the course,you will use some of the statistical techniques that you learned inthe prerequisite Statistics course (PSY 330). There will be no examsin this course, but the project components will be assessed forcompleteness and quality. Please see the course schedule below forthe component due dates.
By the end of the course, you will be able to:
Assignments: Through the course of the semester you willcarry out your research proposal from Psy 341. This project will bebroken down into separate components, and class time will be used toreview material to support your completion of these components. Moredetails will be given in class when each component is assigned;however, here are brief descriptions of each:
2. IRB paperwork, meet and discuss with faculty consultant and me, revise as necessary
3. Revised proposal (Introduction and Methods sections with reference page); turn in along with final graded version from Psy 341
4. Documentation of Professional data collection
5. Data spreadsheet in Excel and descriptive statistics
6. Summary of analytical statistics along with graphs of all possible interactions
7. Draft of results section along with graphs and figure captions
8. Revised draft of results along with draft of discussion section
9. Full paper with format appropriate for submission to an APA journal
10. 10-12 minute poster presentation to class
11. Worksheet evaluations for each classmate's presentation
12. Presentation of poster at departmental research conference
NO make-ups or extended due dates will be given except for aDOCUMENTED emergency. (In other words, weddings, vacations,oversleeping etc. will not qualify as a legitimate excuse.) In orderto qualify for an extension, you must contact me as soon as youremergency allows, and you must schedule the new due date with me assoon as you return to class. If you know ahead of time that you havea university-related conflict, give me documentation ahead oftime.
The evaluation of your assignments / projects will be basedprimarily on how fully and effectively you complete the assignment.However, I will expect all writing to use the conventions of standardwritten English, which includes usage, punctuation, and mechanics(especially spelling). All assignments should be turned in typed,doubled spaced, using 12-pt. Times New Roman font.
Note that the term "draft" does not mean a hastily thrown togetherassignment. All drafts should be complete in content and honestefforts to do an excellent job of fulfilling that part of theproject. For subsequent versions, I will expect you to incorporatefeedback given to you by me or by your peers. Thus, when you turn inyour assignments, also turn in all drafts with accompanyingfeedback.
Please make a copy of your papers before you turn them in, just incase one of them gets lost. Along with your printed version of thefinal paper and the poster, please also turn in an electronic version(email it to me, bring it on a disc or a memory stick).
Collecting Data: We will be using the SONA-System toschedule research and rooms. Vikki, our teaching assistant, will beworking with the SONA-system administrator and you to coordinateactivities. Although Vikki will be assisting us, it is yourresponsibility to schedule rooms, show up for the research,administer credit, etc. Data collection will take place outside ofthe regularly scheduled class times.
Cheating / Plagiarism:
Cheating will not be tolerated. If you are caught cheating youwill receive a grade of F (zero points) on that assignment, or thecourse, at my discretion. Your name and a report documenting theincident will also be given to the dean of your college.
Plagiarism is a form of cheating, punishable (at the discretion ofthe instructor) by failure in the course in which it occurs andpossibly (at the discretion of the Dean) by suspension or dismissalfrom the university.
Plagiarism can take a number of forms, including the re-use ofyour own or another class member's written work without appropriatemodifications and/or without the permission of your instructor.
Plagiarism most commonly occurs when material is taken from asource without proper citation. Whenever material is directly(word-for-word) quoted it must appear in quotation marks and beproperly cited either in the text or in a footnote. In such a case, acitation without quotation marks is not adequate because that impliesthe material quoted is your wording. It is even less acceptable tosimply put the source of the material in a bibliography at the end ofthe paper, with neither quotation marks nor references made in thetext or notes.
Indirect quotations -- that is, points taken from some source butrestated in your own words -- should not appear in quotation marks,but the source from which they came should be cited in the textfollowing the cited material.
If necessary, ask me for further clarification and / or refer toyour text or the APA manual. Remember that a course grade or evenyour undergraduate career could be jeopardized by ignorance in thismatter.
Attendance / Participation / Lateness / Professionalism:Class attendance and participation are vital to your learningexperience. Attendance will not be recorded everyday; however, therewill be 10 attendance points given at random throughout the semester.THESE ARE REQUIRED POINTS, not extra credit points. If you come butdo not participate (e.g. contribute to group activities), I reservethe right to take away your attendance point.
Finally, I expect you to be professional and courteous in yourbehavior. Although I realize that occasional tardiness cannot beavoided, late arrivals disrupt the lecture, which is not fair tothose students who do arrive on time. If you must arrive late orleave early for some reason, please let me know, and sit by the doorso as to minimize the interruption. Other examples of professionalbehavior include turning off your cell phone, not holding sideconversations, and when we are in the computer lab, not using thecomputers for personal tasks such as checking email. Thank you.
Extra Credit: The will be several opportunities for extracredit throughout the semester. Opportunities will include popquizzes, activities, short assignments. The maximum number of extracredit points allowed is 2% of the possible course points (departmentpolicy).
WebCT: All your grades will be posted on WebCT. To accessWebCT, you will use your mySFA ID and password. There are furtherinstructions on the class web page. You will also have all yourassignments returned to you in class after they have been graded.
Remember: If you have any questions over the coursematerial or the assignments, please come discuss them with me or withthe teaching assistant. (It helps to do this before the tests orassignments are due rather than after...) You may also email me atany time.
Grades: You will receive a grade based on the followingpoint system.
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| Assignment #1 Exp. Summary / presentation | |
| Assignment #2 IRB | |
| Assignment #3 Revised proposal | |
| Assignment #4 Professional data collection | |
| Assignment #5 Spreadsheet / descriptive stats | |
| Assignment #6 Analytical stats / graphs | |
| Assignment #7 Draft of results section | |
| Assignment #8 Draft of results and discussion | |
| Assignment #9 Full paper | |
| Assignment #10 Class poster presentation | |
| Assignment #11 Evaluations of classmates | |
| Assignment #12 Department poster presentation | |
| Attendance / Participation | |
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A Note about the Writing Assignments
Good writing skills are among the most important and fundamentalthat you should develop as a student of higher education (and priorto that). No matter what field you decide to explore, writtencommunication skills will allow other people to clearly understandyou, and they will often open doors that would remain closed if youdid not have such skills. For example, many companies routinelydiscard any resumes that contain even a single spelling mistake orgrammatical error.* That's it &endash; no chance for a secondimpression to overcome the first, negative one. Whether you want towork for someone else or be your own boss, to be successful in thisworld, you will generally need to make a favorable impression onothers: they will need to believe that you are competent andprofessional.
So, in this class writing assignments will be taken seriously ontwo levels. The most obvious will be that of content. Incomplete orsuperficial papers will not receive full credit. The second levelupon which your writing assignments will be graded will be for APAformat (when applicable), correct spelling and grammar. Allmisspellings will receive a 0.5 point deduction, even if they are acorrectly spelled word out of context (e.g. if you use the word"there" instead of "their"). In this age of spell checks oncomputers, there is no excuse for most misspellings (if you don'thave spell check, use a dictionary!). Proofreading is essential tofind misused words and grammatical problems. Major grammaticalproblems (e.g. run-on sentences, sentence fragments, subject-verbdisagreements) will receive a 0.5 point deduction, and minor ones(e.g. awkward sentences, transitions, paragraph structure), a 0.25point deduction.
I realize that this is not an English class. However, good writingskills are fundamental and transcend course topic. Therefore, takethe time to write and proofread your work. These papers cansignificantly help your course grade (especially if you are a poortest taker), or they can hurt it if you do not take them seriously.There are many free resources if you do not feel confident about yourwriting: make an appointment to have me review a paper draft, make anappointment to meet with the TA, go to the AARC in the library, orhave a friend give you feedback.
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* Here is a quote from an interview published in the WashingtonPost, June 2003. The person being interviewed is an assistantdirector of a company who is answering questions about hiringpractices at her company.
"You do have to be able to speak intelligently about what youknow. If you're well-spoken, and can explain it back to me -- I'llrespect that," she says. When Van Loon sees a typo on resume, sheknocks an applicant out of the running. Her reasoning: if a candidatecan't handle the details of his own job search, he probably can'tmeet the meticulous standards of the lab team. "You need very highattention to detail ... I need to know if something is going wrong,"she says.
| Date | Day | Activity / Chapter Reading | Due dates / Exams |
| January 16 | M | MLK Holiday | |
| January 18 | W | Intro / Syllabus | |
| January 20 | F | Review control methods | |
| January 23 | M | Feedback on Assignment #1 | |
| January 25 | W | Review ethics | |
| January 27 | F | Review IRB forms | Assignment #1 due |
| January 30 | M | IRB form feedback | |
| February 1 | W | Class presentations | |
| February 3 | F | Class presentations | Assignment #2 due |
| February 6 | M | Talk about proposal revisions | Bring proposal to class |
| February 8 | W | Reference citation review | |
| February 10 | F | Using SONA and obtaining participants | |
| February 13 | M | Prepare to collect data | Assignment #3 due |
| February 15 | W | Prepare to collect data | |
| February 17 | F | Excel spreadsheets | |
| February 20 | M | Descriptive data review | |
| February 22 | W | Graphing basics | |
| February 24 | F | In-class exercises | |
| February 27 | M | Analytical stats review | |
| March 1 | W | Analytical stats review | |
| March 3 | F | Interactions / more graphing | |
| March 6 | M | How to use stats package | |
| March 8 | W | In-class exercises | |
| March 10 | F | In-class exercises | |
| March 13-17 | M-F | Spring Break! | |
| March 20 | M | Answer ques. stats | Assignment #4&5 due |
| March 22 | W | How to graph in Excel | |
| March 24 | F | Writing the Results section | Assignment #6 due |
| March 27 | M | Writing the Results section | |
| March 29 | W | Figure captions / exercises | |
| March 31 | F | In-class peer review | Assignment #7 due |
| April 3 | M | Writing the Discussion section | |
| April 5 | W | Writing the Discussion section | |
| April 7 | F | Writing an Abstract | Assignment #8 due |
| April 10 | M | Submitting to conferences and journals | |
| April 12 | W | Discuss poster/presentation guidelines | |
| April 14 | F | No class - holiday | |
| April 17 | M | No class - holiday until 4:00 pm. | |
| April 19 | W | Presenting at conferences | Assignment #9 due |
| April 21 | F | In-class poster presentations | Assignment #10 due |
| April 24 | M | In-class poster presentations | |
| April 26 | W | In-class poster presentations | |
| April 28 | F | In-class poster presentations | |
| May 1 | M | In-class poster presentations | |
| May 3 | W | In-class poster presentations | Assignment #11 due |
| May 2 or 3 | T OR W | Departmental poster session in afternoon | Assignment #12 |
| May 5 | F | No class |