Engagement with the Learning Process in First-Year Psychology Classes

Students exiting University with a degree of which a large component is Psychology, require an understanding of Psychology as a science and should be able to use this base as a guide for their practice. In forder to attain the skills necessary to achieve this, it is important that students be engaged in the learning process. During 2006 the Psychology 1 units at the University of Tasmania underwent a large overhaul that aimed, among other things, to introduce formative assessment practices, and to both equip and encourage students to become independent learners. We collected Student Engagement information (Ahlfeldt, Mehta & Sellnow, 2005), regarding the extent to which students felt the course emphasised various mental activities at the end of each semester in 2006 and 2007. Generally students perceived no difference in the extent to which lower level cognitive processes were emphasized; however, each year there was an increase in the extent to which students thought that the higher level cognitive skills of evaluating information, arguments or methods were emphasized.