Child Psychology Course (Level 3 Award)

Overview

A distance learning course is the ideal way to gain a Level 3 in Child Psychology. Whether you're looking to go on to further education, improve your job prospects or expand your knowledge, distance learning Child Psychology is a flexible and convenient course, which allows you to comprehensively prepare for a Child Psychology exam or career through home study. What's more, because the distance learning Level 3 Child Psychology course is a fully comprehensive course, no prior knowledge is required.

This programme is designed for people who wish to gain an understanding of the principles and practice of Child Psychology, and the development of children.

Objectives
The objectives of the course are to:

Develop an awareness of psychological approaches to the understanding of child development
Develop a recognition of the application of developmental psychology to certain aspects of child care and education
Create an awareness of different methodological approaches to psychological investigation
Develop a range of skills in using psychological methods

COURSE KEY TOPICS 
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The First Year of Life
The Formation of Attachments
Consequences of Breakdowns in Attachments
The Home, Family and School
Basic Principles of Research Methods
The Development of Visual Perception
The Development of Language and Communication
Intelligence and Intelligence Testing
The Nature/Nurture Debate in the Study of Intelligence
Data Collection and Interpretation
How Children Think
Learning Theory – How Behaviour is Acquired
Freud’s Psychodynamic Theory – An Alternative Approach
Moral Development
The Development of Gender Roles
Aggression in Children
Methods Used in Child Development Research
Play
Learning in School
Behaviour Modification

HOME STUDY SUPPORT
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You will be provided with comprehensive materials designed to provide you with everything required to complete your course of study. You will have your own personal tutor helping you with your course work and with any questions you may have. Plus you can contact our Student Advisors by email or phone for all the practical advice you may need – so we really are with you 100%.

What's more, you'll have access to the online student portal, where you can interact with other students, browse our resource library and manage your account.

COURSE ASSESSMENT
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This course is marked through a process of continuous assessment guided by your tutor following NCFE guidelines. This means that your qualification will be awarded according to your performance on assessments rather than by taking an exam.

We send the full course out with the units listed above, you then read through the course in your own time and complete the assignments which you send to your tutor for marking. There is no word count for these assignments. However, one sentence answers will be rejected and you will have to re-submit it for marking.

Upon verification of the activities, exercises and assignments, a certificate of achievement will be awarded by the national awarding organisation NCFE, as confirmation that your written work has met all of the learning outcomes and assessment criteria for the programme.

COURSE DURATION
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We recommended you spend approximately 90 hours of your time studying for the Child Psychology course. The pace of study is completely up to you. To give an example, if you dedicate 2 hours a week to the course it would take you a year to complete but if you could spare 4 hours a week you could complete it in six months.

Get started today, and you can earn your Level 2 NCFE Award in Child Psychology in as little as six months, or take up to a year, if you prefer – the choice is yours.

Description

The NCFE Level 3 Award in Child Psychology course is divided into twenty comprehensive modules:

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.

Requirements

No prior knowledge or experience is required.