Research Seminar: Development of Values between Childhood and Adulthood
Values truly define who we are, what we find most important, and which priorities we take on in life. It is no wonder that educators aspire to instill values in order to educate children. But why do people prefer certain values over others? And can the environment influence value development? The course will suggest answers to these questions and lead to other questions on value development and the factors influencing it.
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​Research Seminar: Promotion of positive climate and aggression prevention in schools
The course will discuss the promotion of positive school climate, and prevention of violent behavior that may endanger it. We will learn what makes children feel well at school, and what makes them them behave aggressively. We will discuss multiple levels of explanatory factors: personal, family, school and social levels. We will also focus on existing programs for positive school climate and prevention of school violence, their effectiveness and fit to school context.
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Promotion of moral development: affect, cognition, values and behavior
The practicum examines state of the art advances in the understanding of child moral development, between early childhood and adulthood: How do children come to know right from wrong? Is morality a part of our innate makeup, or something we need to be taught? Are we doing the right thing because of our emotions, thoughts, or motivations? How does the social world shape our moral development? On the basis of this understanding, we will examine the role of socialization agents, such as parents, teachers and counselors, in supporting moral development. We will discuss intervention programs to promote moral development and experience its construction and implementation.
Advanced questions in developmental psychology between childhood and early adolescence
How do children and adults develop over time? Do children think differently from adults, or are differences just a matter of experience? Is development primarily genetic or environmental, or a combination of both? What do children learn from their environment? This course will address these questions through an analysis of various theories of human development. The focus will be on the description of development across contexts and in different areas of child development: social, moral, cognitive and more.
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School adjustment
Difficulties in (K-12) school adjustment might significantly influence student's academic achievements as well as one's mental health and positive development. In the course, variables related to school adjustment will be discussed, several procedures to measure school adjustment will be analyzed, and possible preventive interventions to promote positive school adjustment will be presented
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