Course Instructor: Kim Cassidy

Praxis Coordinator: Nell Anderson

Field Site: Overbrook Education Center

Course Description (by Kim Cassidy):

In Educational Psychology (PSYC B203) topics in the psychology of human cognitive, social, and affective behavior are examined and related to educational practice. Issues covered include: learning theories, memory, attention, thinking, motivation, social/emotional issues in childhood and adolescence, behaviorism, metacognition, positive psychology and assessment/learning disabilities.

Fieldwork Description (by Nell Anderson): 

This is a Praxis II course, so the work for the course included weekly visits to a K-8 classroom, where students were actively engaged in classroom assisting, getting to know the children and teachers as well as learning about the school/classroom culture and educational practices. This is the first time that all of the students in a Praxis II course have partnered with one fieldsite.  We were fortunate to work with the Overbrook Educational Center (OEC) in West Philadelphia. OEC is a Philadelphia Community School  and has the largest population of blind and visually impaired students in the entire Philadelphia School District. Slightly under 1/3 of the student population is blind or visually impaired. Students were assigned to regular K-8, Life Skills (LS) and Visually Impaired (VI) and also to Music and Art classrooms.  Many students were in their classrooms during Morning Meeting, where there is a focus on Restorative Practices.