Experiments: The Asch Test

I always found teaching “the experimental method” in sociology a little dull because there were relatively few examples I could use to illustrate the genre. And most of what were available seemed to be created by psychopaths psychologists. It obviously didn’t help that a couple of the really good examples weren’t something that could be […]

Play It Again, Sam*

Someone whose name escapes me once said: “We do not remember days, we remember moments”. And that’s the thing about memory. It doesn’t really work the way commonsense tells us it works. It’s not a simple mechanical process whereby memories are stacked and stored in nice neat compartments, like boxes in a warehouse. Rather, it’s […]

Differential Achievement: The Raw and the Cooked

“Gap in GCSE results between private and state schools widens at highest level”New figures highlighting the results gap between different school types have sparked fresh concerns about education inequalities. The Independent: August 2024  This newspaper headline is fairly indicative of how exam results in England and Wales are generally reported – the raw (unadjusted) numbers […]

Sociology: The Core Concepts Trilogy

Many of you will be familiar with the Cornetto Trilogy of films, the brilliant Shaun of the Dead, the equally-funny Hot Fuzz and that third one they brought-out because of some contract obligation. Allegedly. I could be wrong. Anyways, far be it for me to compare this trilogy with that trilogy. There simply is no […]

BPS Teachers’ Toolkit

Not to be confused with the much older (but still useful) Psychology Teachers Toolkit, this particular Teachers’ Toolkit has more-official origins in the sense it’s a co-production between the British Psychological Society and the Association for the Teaching of Psychology. While both sets of resources are aimed pretty-squarely at A-level / AP Psychology students, the […]

Introducing Sociology

What seems like half a lifetime (but was actually around 20 years) ago I posted a YouTube Trailer called What is Sociology that was part of a much longer 3-part film called Introducing Sociology. Since then the trailer’s garnered around 350,000 views and, as far as I can tell, the original film is no-longer available. […]

Dynamic Learning: Procrastination

The latest in our Dynamic Learning series of films aimed at helping students improve how they study looks at something that most of us experience at one time or another: procrastination. Or as it’s technically known, “Putting stuff off ‘til tomorrow. Or maybe the day after. Sometime, anyway. No, definitely. OMG is it really due […]

Steve Bassett’s Sociology Channel

Steve Bassett’s Channel consists of around 250 reasonably short (10 – 15 minutes mostly) “video lectures”, the last was made around 6 years ago. The earliest content here was made around 11 years ago so if you use the films you need to be aware of possible curriculum changes (in terms of topics and content […]

Dynamic Learning: Procrastination 1: Avoidance and Denial

Most of us try to avoid doing things we don’t particularly like. But for students, research has shown procrastination can have particularly serious consequences, such as increasing stress levels and lowering grades. And the first step to preventing procrastination is to understand the techniques of denial we use that allow it to continue.

Dynamic Learning: Procrastination 2: Prevention Strategies

If procrastination is a problem, how do we prevent it? While the conventional advice is to focus on the future rewards of studying, this doesn’t actually solve the pressing problem of present procrastination. This film looks at strategies you can use to overcome this problem.

Dynamic Learning: Procrastination 3: Facing the Fear

A major cause of procrastination is fear: Of failure. Of criticism. Of not reaching the high standards we’ve set for ourselves. But while it’s one thing to admit this, it’s another to understand how to overcome it. And this is where the story of Joe Simpson – badly injured and left for dead while climbing […]

Dynamic Learning: Context-Dependent Memory

If you’ve ever returned somewhere and found your mind suddenly filled with memories, you’ve experienced what psychologists call context-dependent memory. Research has shown that our recall of information is much stronger when it’s done in the environment where it was learned. The three simple strategies outlined in this short film will show you how to […]

Learndojo Psychology

If you’re a teacher or student looking for AQA A-Level and GCSE Psychology resources then Learndojo is probably a pretty good place to start. The site offers extensive Notes on a wide range of AS and A2 topics (Methods, Approaches, Issues, Debates and a whole heap more) plus a couple of sections on Practice Exam […]

(Re)Discovering Sociology

If you don’t subscribe to the British Sociological Association’s “Discovering Sociology” newsletter you’re missing-out on the free “journal corner” offering of “curriculum friendly summaries of papers published in the BSA journal Sociology” (which presumably means cutting-out all the dull bits and just moving straight to exam-friendly stuff – I could be wrong). Although when they […]

Definition of the Situation: The Thomas Theorem

The Thomas Theorem, created by W.I.Thomas and his wife Dorothy (The Child in America, 1928), is a simple and interesting way to introduce students to the social constructionist / Interactionist approach in Sociology, for a couple of reasons: Firstly, the Theorem – “It is not important whether or not the interpretation is correct, if we […]