Grant program: New Ways of Teaching, New Ways of Learning

Grant recipient: Rebecca Cobb, Department of Psychology

Project team: Jessica Ferreira and Richard Rigby, research assistants

Timeframe: September 2020 to August 2021

Funding: $4,980

Course addressed: PSYC 490 – Psychology Honours Seminar

Description: For this project, I will focus on helping students develop a writing practice and encourage them to view writing as a process that takes place in a community. In the past, the honours seminar focused on discussions of the honours proposal, research design and analyses, ethics, preparing for graduate school, and diversity in research. The current course will focus on some of the same issues, but with an emphasis on developing a writing practice and learning how to communicate about research. As part of their writing development, they will form writing groups (3-4 students) and meet and discuss their writing process and plans weekly. Students will also complete weekly self-reflections with various prompts related to their feelings about their writing, their projects, course topics, and their personal development.

Questions addressed: 

• Do students experience a decline in anxiety/procrastination about writing and an increase in self-confidence?
• Do students feel connected to and supported by their peers and does this increase over the semester?
• Do students experience gains in their writing skill and productivity over the course of the seminar?
• Does participation in the seminar relate to students’ motivation/interest in an academic career/graduate work or their confidence in their success?

Knowledge sharing: I will have informal conversations with colleagues in my writing group, teaching group, and those who teach this course to impart my impressions, findings, and conclusions. I will share the final report with these same people. It is possible that the department may be interested in the outcomes, in which case I will discuss them in a department meeting. I will also share the report with the UGSC as we are discussing ways to revise the honours program. People in other departments who teach honours or who have been considering developing a writing group may also be interested.