About the course
This course offers a multidisciplinary approach to the study of human development throughout the lifespan. Students will learn about a range of theoretical perspectives on human development. They will examine threats to healthy development as well as protective factors that promote resilience. Students will learn about physical, cognitive, and social-emotional development from the prenatal period through old age and will develop their research and inquiry skills by investigating issues related to human development.
Human Development throughout the Lifespan
Course Credit
1
Course Price
$ 550.00
Course Developer
My Learning Oasis
Prerequisite(s) (Text)
Any university or university/college preparation course in social sciences and humanities, English, or Canadian and world studies
Course Code
Department Head & Contact Information
HHG4M
Ravi Sharma(ravi@mylearningoasis.com)
Course Type
University/College
Grade Level
Grade 12
Course Development Date
June 10th, 2021
Course Outline
Developmental Theories, risk, and resilience
In this unit students will study the structuralist theoretical perspective and use it to explore human development throughout the lifespan. Students will examine human development by way of information-processing and learning theoretical perspectives. They will evaluate and explore human development according to systematic and humanistic perspectives. Students will explore possible threats to healthy development at various stages and ways to mitigate them. They will examine protective factors at the individual, familial, and community levels that can enhance the individual’s ability to quickly “bounce back” from a bad experience, physical or mental. They will explore human development opportunities at the community level and how to get involved.
Expected Hours of Instruction: 28 hours
Understanding Physical Development
Humans physically change throughout their lifespan. This unit will explore the major changes and the associated theories and factors that affect these changes. They will examine the physiology of the brain, its key structures and their functions and how they change throughout its lifespan. They will look at and study some of the major milestones such as motor skills development (early years), sensory faculties and later-life motor skills. Students will look at the long term impact that the environmental exposure has in the early stages of development. Regarding the brain, students will identify factors that can affect its proper development during the prenatal period. They will examine brain plasticity with reference to the brain’s response to injury, illness, and environmental factors. Students will explore some major theories of brain development, including the ones presented by the Gurian Institute, related to young children. Students will look at the impacts that the mother’s health can potentially have on neonatal brain development and postnatal brain development. A lot of mphasis is placed on exploring language acquisition and its relationship to cognitive development. Students will examine factors that can affect brain development positively and negatively, for instance, play-based activities, thinning type activities, foreign language, and math. Students will demonstrate their learning from this unit by designing a play based activity that will facilitate positive brain development in kids, by including all or most of the concepts learnt.
Expected Hours of Instruction: 27 hours
Cognitive Development, Language Development, And Intelligence
This unit introduces students to theories of cognitive, moral, and language development of humans throughout their lifespan. They will examine different kinds of intelligence, such as the ones outlined in the Multiple Intelligence Theory, and ways to demonstrate such intelligence. They will explore the limitations that standardized tests present on measuring intelligence. They will explore how individual differences and the environment may affect cognitive development and language.
Expected Hours of Instruction: 28 hours
Social-Emotional Development And Personality
This unit explores how secure and insecure attachment to parents and caregivers can affect infants and children socio- emotionally immediately and well into their adolescence. They will examine the development of emotions throughout the lifespan and factors that may affect this development. Students will explore the role that birth order and temperament play in an individual’s development and personality. They will then study the relationship between personality and social interactions. They will examine the role that family plays in enhancing an individual's confidence and their socialization skill and socio-emotional development. The impact of marginalization (e.g., marginalization related to factors such as age, poverty, disability, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, religion, low literacy levels) on socioemotional development will be studied and ways to mitigate such impacts will be addressed.
Expected Hours of Instruction: 25 hours
Final Exam
This is a proctored exam worth 30% of your final grade.
Expected Hours of Instruction: 2 hours
Total: 110 hours
Resources
The course material (class notes and necessary handouts) will be provided by the
teacher.
The students will be required to have:
● Access to a library or the Internet to do research
● Access to internet as well as electronic devices for note taking and communication for those taking the class online
Overall Curriculum Expectations
A. RESEARCH AND INQUIRY SKILLS
A1 explore topics related to human development, and formulate questions to guide their research;
A2 create research plans, and locate and select information relevant to their chosen topics, using appropriate social science research and inquiry methods;
A3 assess, record, analyse, and synthesize information gathered through research and inquiry;
A4 communicate the results of their research and inquiry clearly and effectively, and reflect on and evaluate their research, inquiry, and communication skills.
B. DEVELOPMENTAL THEORIES, AND RISK AND RESILIENCE
B1 demonstrate an understanding of a variety of theoretical perspectives on human development;
B2 demonstrate an understanding of threats to healthy development throughout the lifespan and of a variety of protective factors that can increase an individual’s resilience and reduce the impact of these threats.
C. UNDERSTANDING PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
C1 demonstrate an understanding of physical development, including brain physiology and development, throughout the lifespan;
C2 demonstrate an understanding of sensory and motor development at different stages of the lifespan;
C3 demonstrate an understanding of contextual factors that can affect physical development, particularly brain development, throughout the lifespan and of the effects of these factors.
D. COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT, LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT, AND INTELLIGENCE
D1 demonstrate an understanding of theories of cognitive development and of changes in aspects of cognitive development throughout the lifespan;
D2 explain the processes and physiological foundations of language acquisition and development throughout the lifespan;
D3 demonstrate an understanding of issues related to defining, measuring, and developing intelligence;
D4 analyse the effects of contextual factors on cognitive development and language use throughout the lifespan.
E. SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND PERSONALITY
E1 demonstrate an understanding of social-emotional development throughout the lifespan and of ways of influencing such development;
E2 demonstrate an understanding of various influences on personality development and identity formation throughout the lifespan;
E3 demonstrate an understanding of how factors affect social-emotional development, with an emphasis on the process of socialization.
Special Accommodations
Only Some students are able, with accommodations, to be part of a regular course curriculum and to demonstrate independent learning. These accommodations allow access to the course without any dilution of the knowledge and skills the student is expected to demonstrate. These required accommodations to facilitate the student’s learning will be identified in his or her IEP (see IEP Standards, 2000, page 11*). It is likely that IEP for may or all courses will reflect the same accommodations. The instructions and accommodations are geared to meet the diverse needs of learners.
The three types of accommodations that are going to be used are:
i) Instructional accommodations - changes in teaching/learning strategies facilitated by different styles of presentation; methods of organization; the use of technology and multimedia.
ii) Environmental accommodations - Certain classroom settings and preferential seating may benefit these students.
iii) Assessment: assessment procedures that enable the student to demonstrate his or her learning, such as Multiple Intelligence Theory, giving more time to complete tasks (see page 29 of the IEP Resource Guide, 2004, for more examples).
For students who require accommodations for only the mathematics courses, the assessment and evaluation of their achievement will be based on the appropriate course curriculum expectations and the achievement levels outlined in this document. The IEP box on the students’ Provincial Report Cards will not be checked, and no information on the provision of accommodations will be included.
ed, and no information on the provision of accommodations will be included.
* Taken from: Ministry of Education, Ontario. Extracted from The Ontario Curriculum, Grades 9 to 12: Social Sciences and Humanities, 2013; Pg 35-38 Date of extraction: Sunday, March 14, 2021 Program Considerations
Program Considerations For English Language Learners
Students from a variety of cultural and linguistic backgrounds. For many of these students,
English is not their spoken language. They may be coming from highly sophisticated
educational systems, while others may have come from regions where access to formal
schooling was limited. These students offer a rich addition to the classroom experience by
way of their background knowledge and experience. All teachers will assist with their English-
language development. In mathematics the teachers will include appropriate adaptations and
strategies in their instructions and assessments to facilitate the success of the English
language learners in their classrooms. Some of these strategies and adaptations are:
modification of some or all of the course expectations so that they are challenging but
attainable for the learner at his or her present level of English proficiency, given the necessary
support from the teacher.
Teaching/Learning Strategy
The key learning strategy at My Learning Oasis Elite Private School is Constructivism. This format facilitates learning by many techniques, most or all of which will be adopted in the classroom. The most dominant of these is group learning. The facilitator places students of different backgrounds in the same group so that they can feed off each other. Each may bring to the table a different reasoning strategy to facilitate problem-solving. Now, each student becomes a learner and a teacher at the same time, as he/she has to communicate his/her solution. This builds the students' knowledge base and by default, increases their confidence to speak in a crowd, albeit a small group at the beginning. The famous educationalist, Vygotsky, proved that by placing students in a group they function at the upper level of their zone of proximal development, each one scaffolding the other.
This strategy is further enhanced by the teacher asking leading questions as opposed to giving the answer outright, then allowing for group discussion. The students are encouraged to make connections between what they have learnt and their life experiences, then share with the group. The effect of this strategy is intrinsic motivation and learning. Each student develops an expanded appreciation of the topic at hand by seeing how it applies in different settings around the world by way of listening to their group members.
This Constructivist approach will be further accentuated by implementing “fish-bowling”. There are many ways to implement this technique. The one that will mostly be used will be by dividing up the larger problem (technical, mathematics, science, or otherwise) into smaller bits and have each student thoughtfully master one part. That student then teaches the group and facilitates a discussion reflection about the strategy (computational or otherwise) used in the solution. Each student in turn does this.
The above techniques enable students to reflect on the material learnt, make real life connections, and develop problem solving skills. One important by-product of the technique of Constructivism is that each student develops an appreciation of each other’s culture. This cultivates healthy people’s skill, which is not only important for the professional world but for life itself.
Constructivism lends itself well to students whose first language is not the language of instruction and who is new to the class. While other strategies will be used for students having difficulty with the English Language, this technique will definitely be used to enhance their English skill.
Assessment And Evaluation
At My Learning Oasis, course facilitators do not wait for a quiz or exam to determine how well a student is doing. Here, evaluation is an on-going exercise. The pedagogical techniques (refer to Teaching and Learning Strategies) used at My learning Oasis are perhaps the best techniques suited for on-going assessment, hence, they being an integral part of our delivery methodologies.
Concrete assessments are made through projects and assignments. However, the evaluation is based on “our flavor” of the Mastery Teaching technique. This ensures that the emphasis is on the quality of learning and NOT grading. Students' projects and homework will continuously be evaluated and re-evaluated with appropriate guidance to meet the school’s and Ministry’s expectations. At My Learning Oasis, we will work with the students until the projects meet a minimum of a B-grade, unless in extreme circumstances where the willful negligence of the students force lower grades. While this is a lot more taxing on the facilitator, it does not matter because My Learning Oasis is a Learner-centered institution NOT a Grade- Centered nor a Teacher-Centered institution.
Four categories of knowledge and skills are outlined in the achievement chart - knowledge and understanding, thinking, communication, and application. Student’s work is assessed and evaluated with respect to these categories, and that achievement of particular expectations is considered within the appropriate categories.
A final grade will then be recorded for this course and if that grade is 50% or higher, a credit is granted to the student and recorded for this course. The final grade for this course will be determined as follows:
● For material evaluated throughout the course, seventy percent of the grade will be assigned. This portion of the grade should reflect the student's consistency in his/her level of achievement throughout the course, although special consideration should be given to more recent evidence of achievement.
● Thirty percent of the grade will be based on a final evaluation, which is administered towards the end of the course
Final Exam 30%
Grading for all course work, projects, presentation, participation, interim quizzes and
exams
70%
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