Service Learning: Supporting Schools with Effective Learning Strategies 4H PSYCH4097

  • Academic Session: 2025-26
  • School: School of Psychology and Neuroscience
  • Credits: 20
  • Level: Level 4 (SCQF level 10)
  • Typically Offered: Semester 2
  • Available to Visiting Students: No
  • Collaborative Online International Learning: No
  • Curriculum For Life: No

Short Description

Service Learning is a teaching strategy that bridges knowledge obtained at university with real-life problems in the community. Here specifically the aim is to teach students various learning strategies from Cognitive Psychology.

Timetable

15 hours of teaching sessions over ten weeks (including 3-hour workshops in the first weeks). There is an up to 3-hour placement. Students are required to work as part of a team and schedule regular time outside of formal teaching for independent project-based work including the preparation for weekly in-class presentations and the placement/service.

Requirements of Entry

Successful completion of level 3H psychology single honours

Excluded Courses

None

Assessment

Reflection report (80%) will ask students to review the literature, provide a detailed description of the tutorials, and reflecting on how their implementations connect with the literature.

Participation and engagement (20%) for attending and engaging with the workshops and the service.

Are reassessment opportunities available for all summative assessments? Not applicable for Honours courses

Reassessments are normally available for all courses, except those which contribute to the Honours classification. For non-Honours courses, students are offered reassessment in all or any of the components of assessment if the satisfactory (threshold) grade for the overall course is not achieved at the first attempt. This is normally grade D3 for undergraduate students and grade C3 for postgraduate students. Exceptionally it may not be possible to offer reassessment of some coursework items, in which case the mark achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade. Any such exceptions for this course are described below.

Course Aims

The aim of this Service Learning course is for students to learn about research-informed learning strategies from Cognitive Psychology and to discuss and critically evaluate theoretical explanations. The course aims to develop confidence and ability of students presentation skills. Another aim is to translate research-based findings into practical applications. Thus, for their placement, student will create and deliver how-to-study tutorials to pupils. These tutorials can take different formats (e.g., in-person tutorials, to podcasts, or online, live videos, and/or open resources).

Intended Learning Outcomes of Course

By the end of this course students will be able to:

■ evaluate a range of learning strategies from Cognitive Psychology and their theories and obtain a critical understanding of empirical findings and the research methods used to obtain the findings.

■ translate research findings/theory into applicable learning strategies fostering thinking about implementation, challenges, practical issues on how to teach other people.

■ enhance science communication, presentation, and team-working skills through in-class presentations and delivery of tutorials to pupils in the schools.

■ reflect on the service experience to gain awareness of their role and the role of others in the success of an implementation through application of knowledge in the 'real-world', building resilience.

■ Exercise autonomy on how they design their tutorials for pupils and how they present research findings to their peers; building confidence.

Minimum Requirement for Award of Credits

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.