Research methodology in the curriculum design of the psychology career

Summary

The work: curricular design in the career of psychology attending to the learning needs of the research methodology subject, was developed taking into account the difficulties that students present for the development of an investigation and mainly in the methodological design part where The collection of information, analysis of results and the evaluation and information constitute a problem for the student because they do not have the knowledge to develop the statistical analyzes and other actions that correspond to knowledge of mathematics.

The problem posed is the following:

issue

Does the content of the Research Methodology course correspond to what the student actually needs for their professional performance?

The objectives set in the work are:

General objective:

Organize the contents of the Research Methodology subject and its location taking into account the precedence of other subjects necessary for the training of the Psychology student.

Specific objectives:

1. Analyze the basic knowledge of mathematics and statistics that students who begin the career of Psychology have.

2. Identify the training needs of students to understand all the steps of an investigation with the corresponding data analysis.

3. Guide how the study plan should be modified to obtain the necessary knowledge of the students.

Hypothesis: The rearrangement of the subjects in the Psychology career guarantees a better understanding of them, especially, it would guarantee a superior investigative capacity in the students. In the development of the work, different measurement instruments were applied that yielded the following conclusions and recommendations as results: Conclusions: Students who enter to study in the career of Psychology do not have the necessary preparation to understand the elementary calculations of a statistical analysis. recommendations: Carry out a rearrangement of the subjects of the Psychology career ensuring that the statistical subject is taught before Research Methodology I and II and that the first chapters of Statistics (first meeting) are dedicated to reaffirming basic concepts of mathematics for better understanding of the subject.

Introduction:

In the University Headquarters of Sancti Spíritus, the career of Psychology is studied within the group of Humanities careers.

Most of the students who enroll in this career come from the social workers course.

In the analysis carried out of the difficulties that the students present, it was found that they do not have knowledge to understand part of the content of the Research Methodology subject, so an analysis of the characteristics of the students, of the knowledge of the basic subjects, the curricular design of the career, etc, etc.

The Sancti Spíritus University Headquarters has been increasing its enrollment and has increased the number of careers, as well as the sources of entry to them, so it was necessary to make an analysis of the knowledge of the students of the career that we take as a study by Difficulties in learning part of the Research methodology signature appear in it, detecting as a problem situation: Low level of knowledge of mathematics, none of statistics and difficult understanding of the calculations that must be made in the statistical analysis of the data collected in an investigation.

Issue:

Does the content of the Research Methodology course correspond to what the student actually needs for their professional performance?

General objective:

Organize the contents of the Research Methodology subject and its location taking into account the precedence of other subjects necessary for the training of the Psychology student.

Specific objectives:

1. Analyze the basic knowledge of mathematics and statistics that students who begin the career of Psychology have.

2. Identify the training needs of students to understand all the steps of an investigation with the corresponding data analysis.

3. Guide how the study plan should be modified to obtain the necessary knowledge of the students.

Research Questions:

1. What knowledge of mathematics and statistics do students who enter the career of Psychology in the SUM require to face the subject Research Methodology?

2. How to structure the subjects so that there is adequate precedence when developing the Research Methodology subject?

3. Will students need a leveling plan to acquire the necessary knowledge to understand the subject or take the subject Statistics before Research Methodology?

Research justification

Analyzing the Professional Model of the Psychology career we see that one of the aspects that you establish is:

Being able to conceive, design, conceive and carry out fundamental or applied research that expanding the psychological knowledge in general or the knowledge of a psychological reality in a given moment, allow the problems of the profession to be solved more efficiently.

When teaching Psychology students the subjects Research Methodology I and II, in the part of the content that carries mathematical calculations (sample selection, coding, data collection and analysis, tabulation, etc.) the students have no basis for understand that part of the content so the subject is oriented superficially, which results in them not mastering all the content of the subject and therefore not being able to acquire the necessary skills to develop an investigation with all the requirements that this one carries.

Theoretical framework

The social role of the psychologist has only grown and expanded since the emergence of this profession in the first quarter of this century. That is why today it is difficult to list all the socially significant functions that the psychologist can perform. Hence, we consider the efficiency of the exercise of the profession in terms of the capacity to obtain the maximum performance of all individual, group and institutional human faculties.

The spheres of action of this career are those that due to their importance, due to the more comprehensive nature of their particular methods and means, can be considered the most representative to characterize the study plan, not as specialization routes, but as channels through the which the student confirms the variations that the general of his fields adopts in particular sphere.

The professional must be able to:

• Construct, select, apply, read and interpret instruments in any of the professional's spheres of action (health, education, society).

• Prepare, select, apply and evaluate procedures for the diagnosis, interpretation, correction, transformation and development of the characteristics of group processes in their different contexts and spheres of activation.

• Design, apply and evaluate the effects of systems of educational actions or of any other type on the development of the personality and its better education to the requirements of our society.

• Conceive, design and carry out fundamental or applied research that, by expanding psychological knowledge in general or the knowledge of a psychological reality at a given moment, allows the problems of the profession to be solved more efficiently.

The LOGSE system establishes the need to develop a Curriculum Project as an intermediate level of concretion between the Base Curriculum Design and the classroom programming. The basic Curricular Design offers us the arrival point of all educational process, the basic and generic purposes of the learning-teaching process, the minimums to be achieved.

How to make a curricular design of the Social Guarantee programs (DCGS) step by step.

How to make a diagnosis of the characteristics of the students to adapt the project to their real and specific needs.

What socio-educational intervention strategies to use with the most conflictive students to "hook" with their motivations, interests and vital expectations. Work educationally with them, not against them.

How to evaluate the entire educational process in a participatory, democratic and, above all, educational way, where the students themselves learn to say their "own" word.

How to do all this as a team. The teachers themselves work as a team and build a team with the students.

In short, how can we go from often feeling like “policemen” who control “parked” students, to feeling like educators who accompany people who need us, and for whom perhaps… we are their penultimate opportunity.

But these ultimate purposes of any educational process have to be contextualized and specified based on the characteristics of the students with whom we are going to work and the socio-cultural environment in which we are going to carry out the educational work. Therefore, the starting point is the concrete reality of boys and girls, their needs, motivations, expectations and capacities. The point of arrival, the basic skills necessary for these young people to access standardized resources and learn to experience themselves and their environment in a rewarding and enriching way.

In this sense, this book tries to be a tool in order to organize and make our educational intervention more effective along that path to travel between the start and the goal of the educational process. That is why it is proposed as a document not only for reading, but for teamwork, through which we develop the Curriculum Project corresponding to our specific Social Guarantee program, which the author calls "Social Guarantee Curriculum Design".

But this book is not limited to how to build and evaluate this educational intervention project, but offers concrete strategies on how to intervene educationally with them from an educational line marked by the Pedagogy of Everyday Life, where the daily life, the group and the relationship become the most important educational elements, and the educator becomes a mediator, a true educator and not just a transmitter of knowledge.

De Miguel (1996) in an approach to the concept of professional development and from analyzing several proposals defines it as: «A process of continuous training throughout the entire professional life that produces a change and / or improvement in the behavior of teachers, in the ways of thinking, evaluating and acting on teaching »; In this regard, the essential idea is shared but it is understood that in the end it is restricted to teaching when in reality it should be about the direction of the pedagogical process in an integral way with greater emphasis on the teaching - learning process.

This same author proposes some aspects that stands out as main for professional development, which we share, relating below:

• Pedagogical development: where the teacher's performance to conceptualize, understand and proceed in educational practice is valued as a fundamental professional function, professionalism that is evidenced when, in the institution or classroom, he reflexively decides on the most appropriate processes to follow, when he foresees, acts and values their work systematically.

• Psychological Development: assesses personal maturity, mastery of skills and strategies for communication in the classroom, and in the community.

• Cooperative Development: values the skills of cooperation and dialogue with colleagues, the establishment of strategies towards negotiation and problem solving and especially in the creation of communication and support networks to understand educational phenomena and practical activity. This aspect, in our conditions, is seen in the development of the professional debates that must be carried out, as part of the methodological work at the different organizational levels established in the different teachings.

• Career Development: values job satisfaction and the possibility of progressing within the system; Which he sees interrelated but moved by two key elements such as motivation and constant feedback. The development in the career has to be seen in the professional career as a pedagogue; the motivation, in the degree of affection for the profession and the intention marked in its future projection, and the constant feedback in the investigation and investigation of its practice, in the permanent search for methods that make it grow as a professional and as a human being.

If one reflects on the actions of the teacher during the curricular design, understood as the process aimed at elaborating the conception of a given level and the teaching-learning process that allows its formation (H. Fuentes 1996); When it moves through the different levels of concretion, it can be said that it includes the elaboration of the essential strategy of the curriculum and that of the teaching-learning process at the level of discipline, subject, didactic unit and that we extend beyond the class systems and of each of the teaching tasks.

In particular, we refer to the levels that are conceived by J. Fonseca (1999) for the curricular design in the transformation of the Basic Secondary School, where the interrelation that between these is established in the actions to be continuously improved is observed and that summarizes it through the following graph:

By adding the experience acquired through the study of literature that addresses curricular theory in other countries and in Cuba, the development of research on curriculum design in the transformations of Basic Secondary School and in the tutoring of student scientific works aimed at design of Didactic Units in Mathematics, it was found that the curricular design in its three dimensions: design, development and evaluation, contributes to the development of teacher professionalization, since it establishes that the teacher is fully employed in the performance of their tasks. functions.

On what is the idea being defended based?

When making an assessment of the logic of action and the dynamics that the curriculum design imprints on the teacher, it is appreciated that:

It is necessary for the student to have a full command of the content of the discipline or subject he teaches, its epistemology, history and particular didactics, in order to be able to analyze different representations of the object of study, establish links between concepts, relationships and procedures; look for problems and problematic situations that respond to the needs and motivations of students; be able to establish the didactic structure according to the levels of depth and assimilation required.

In accordance with the epistemological position that the teacher has, on the knowledge in general and the science that he explains in particular, he will interpret the design and propose the curricular development in his classroom either by discovery, invention, personal construction, internalization of codes, rules, assimilation of cultural norms and guidelines or a didactic integration of these under a dialectical - materialist perspective where, without being eclectic, non-absolute positions are adopted.

In addition to allowing to cover communication situations such as the delimitation of meaning, the way of transmitting knowledge, how it is structured and reworked, the use of knowledge in dissimilar situations and the systematization that it requires.

It is necessary to have a general culture that allows to establish interdisciplinary relationships, to give output, from the potentialities of the content of science that is taught, to the main contents or transversal axes that constitute requirements of current curricula, we refer to the legal, labor and economic education, for health and sexual, aesthetic, environmental and in particular patriotic, military and internationalist education.

Of course, this general culture requires making use of new computer techniques, appreciating the beauty and good taste of different artistic manifestations and being able to transmit it to their students.

The pedagogical, psychological, philosophical and sociological principles are mastered and one is able to search in these sources what aspects are revealed in the teaching - learning process and their influence to address them appropriately according to the context. Curriculum design is based on these disciplines, which are interrelated in professional activities.

Pedagogy provides the aspects related to the concept of Education, the value system and the necessary ethical foundation that entails social and political implications, from it the key notion of training arises, linked to the conceptual, procedural, evaluative, affective and attitudinal components. Didactics, as one of its parts, highlights the rational and organizational dimension, conceptualizes teaching and learning and addresses their relationships.

The psychological conceptions will allow to specify who they will have as the center of attention and the adequate assessment of the inter-psychic and the intra-psychic in the process to adequately address learning, affective and communication relationships between subjects, as well as the target elements. cognitive skills that lead the learner to independence and self-control of their own intellectual development.

In sociology you will find the relationships that are established between the educational system and society at a macro level, as well as the social processes that take place within educational institutions, stages, cycles and daily practices, at a meso and micro level respectively., and how in our case it addresses the influences of social demands on educational processes and school, family and community relationships.

On the other hand, the philosophical positions will make it possible not to absolutize one or another aspect that influences and intervenes in the teaching-learning process, establishing its dialectical nature and preventing it from falling into idealistic, pragmatic and positivist positions.

The conception and execution of the different components: objectives, content, methods, means, forms of organization and evaluation must be preceded by the knowledge of the real conditions of the students and of everything that influences the training process through comprehensive diagnosis that allows addressing, in its different dimensions, individual differences or diversity.

When referring to the different dimensions, the diagnosis is seen as a continuous process, useful in the forecasting or design phase itself, but which also allows to constantly update the characterization of the subjects learning objects, the context and the conception of the different components so that an efficient and quality teaching - learning process is carried out. This implies knowing how to determine indicators and sub-indicators, elaborate instruments, apply them, process them and give them the appropriate readings to perfect the work and that is to investigate their own practice recognized as the expeditious way of professionalization.

In this regard, in the material prepared by a group of Cuban authors from the Latin American and Caribbean Pedagogical Institute (IPLAC) (Addine Fdez., Fátima…; 1998) it is stated:

«Didactic research pursues theoretical inquiry that allows critical and reflective analysis of the practice of teaching and learning supported by conceptual and methodological elements that reflect the scientific method of obtaining knowledge.

The teacher who incorporates into his teaching work a scientific attitude towards the process that he conceives and directs contributes to the professionalization of his activity. Thus, executing together with teaching the scientific search and the solution of problems of the teaching-learning process leads the teacher to carry out a specialized social practice and, as is logical and necessary, indicates exactly the enrichment of the teacher's work by raise your teacher-researcher training. The teacher is the main professional researcher ».

Later, in this same material it is said:

«The professionalization of the teacher implies incorporating into their work the ability to address the scientific problems of learning as a process and as a product. This is equivalent to discovering these problems, foreseeing possible solutions - solution hypotheses - and getting to apply the scientific methodology that leads to the solution of these problems. The professionalization of the teacher, with the incorporation of the systematization of their scientific activity implies:

• Attitude and management for change and improvement;

• Continuous inquiry into problems and their solutions;

• Permanent development of their knowledge about the teaching - learning process;

• Integrity of professional scientific thought and action;

• Constant generation of a professional culture, a premise of teacher self-improvement.

This last quality, a scientific attitude of the teacher, is self-transforming, which seeks changes in the teacher by their own decision and generated by mastery and understanding of the scope of their professional activity. Self-transformation demands a creative attitude, systematically placing oneself in the face of the goal of improving practice every day, seeking change and self-improvement in ways of thinking, anticipating, reflecting, evaluating and acting in teaching; elements that will be reflected in student learning ».

Then the curricular practice is characterized by constantly facing the interrelated design, adaptation and redesign tasks. The design as the forecasting process given in the preparation stage; adaptation, although also seen as a forecasting process, given through the adjustment of the prescribed curricular design to the specific conditions of the institution, at a macro level, of the group and students, at a micro level, and redesign as the result of the re-elaboration of the designed, where the insufficiencies of the initial or adequate model, detected in practice as a result of research or validation, are eliminated.

Decision-making regarding the components for their proper selection, sequencing and organization must ensure that students achieve progress in their comprehensive and developer learning, so it is another factor that the teacher must bear in mind to measure the effectiveness of their design and curricular practice and therefore the professional development achieved.

Cooperation, professional debate and exchange with colleagues with an open and flexible position to accept criticism and suggestions about the didactic strategies designed and / or establish other shared ones that allow solving problems.

Hypothesis:

The reordering of the subjects in the Psychology career guarantees a better understanding of them, especially, it would guarantee a superior investigative capacity in the students.

Design of the experiment:

1. Analyze the career guide for Psychology.

2. Analyze the results of the research reports of the first year students of Psychology.

3. Prepare a survey where all the necessary data are collected to determine whether or not a modification in the study plan is necessary.

4. Select the Universe and sample it.

5. Apply the survey to the selected sample.

6. Analyze the data obtained

7. Make the report of results

Research Type: Non-experimental

Universe: 1st year group of TS Psychology with 20 Students

CyJI Psychology 1st Year Group with 25 Students

Total number of students that make up the Universe: 50. Of them 12 have not attended classes, so there are 38 possible to participate in the investigation

Probabilistic sample Normal

N: Population (Psychology students in the 2004-2005 academic year) 137 students

n: Sample (students who attended the 1st year of the career in the academic year 2004-2005) 26 students

Variables to analyze:

1. Knowledge of mathematics of the students entering the career of Psychology.

2. Assimilation capacity of the Research Methodology subject with all the statistical part of it.

Results obtained when applying the measuring instrument to 26 students:

Measuring instrument No 1

Questionnaire:

1. Upon entering the Psychology career, your level of education was:

Bachelor of Science:… 0… = 0%, Bachelor of Arts:… 19… = 73%., Bachelor of Science and Letters… 7 = 27%….

2. You consider your knowledge of mathematics

Good… 2… = 7.7%…

Regular… 22… = 84.6%…

Bad… 2… = 7.7%..

3. From the career you are studying, do you know the occupational profile after graduation?

Yes …… 19… = 73%…..

No …… 7… = 27%….

4. How do the subjects of the degree turn out for you?

Easy …… 4… = 15.4%…

Medium difficult …… 22… = 84.6% …….

Very difficult …… 0… = 0% ………

5. You consider that you have basic knowledge to understand the statistical calculations part of the Research Methodology signature.

Yes… 10… = 39.5%….

No… 16… = 61.5%…

6. In the research you did, you did the statistical analysis

-according to the book …… 6… = 23%…,

-or did you take the sample with a predetermined%… 20… = 77% ……

As shown in the results of the application of measuring instrument No. 1, we can see that:

• 73% of the students are bachelor's degrees in letters

• 7.7% consider that they are good in mathematics

• 84.6% consider that the subjects are moderately difficult

• 61.8% consider that they do not have basic elements to understand statistical calculations

• 77% say they worked with a predetermined sample without doing statistical analysis.

Analysis of the disapproved:

Of 19 unsuccessful, 14 reported being bachelor's degrees in letters for 74% and 5 reported being bachelors in letters for 26% of the total of failures.

Measuring instrument No. 2

Origin of the students who enter the career of Psychology of the SUM Sancti Spíritus:

Course	T. Soc	CSJI	Inst. Art	UJC frame	Org Table	Minint	Minfar	MTSS	Promot. cultural	Min Cult	CTC	FMC	Video Room
05/04	91	26	7	4	9	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
06/05	108	61	4	6	3	8	4	4	one	two	two	one	two

---–

Course	Work Soc.	CSJI	Art Inst	Picture	Others	Total
05/04	91 = 66.5%	26 = 19%	7 = 5%	13 = 9.5%	0 = 0%	137
06/05	108 = 52.4%	61 = 29.6%	4 = 1.9%	9 = 4.4%	24 = 11.7%	206

As can be seen in the graph, Origin of Psychology students, the highest% of income at the University Venue comes from the Social Workers course, who graduate with a Bachelor of Arts degree

Total participants: 26 students

Measuring instrument No 3

Simple quiz app to check basic math knowledge.

1. If the total number of students in a school is 525 and the freshman classroom has 22 students. Determine what% the freshman classroom represents out of the total number of students in the school.

R /

13- 25 points

1- 15 points

12- 0 points

Average: 13 pts

2. If the academic results of a group of chosen students is the following:

Student	Evaluation
Mario	5
Pedro	3
rose	4
Raul	5
Manuel	two
Hyacinth	5
rose	4
miracles	4
Juan	3

Determine the average value of the evaluation obtained.

R /

18- 25 pts

8- 0 pts

Average: 17.3 pts

3. Using the data from exercise 2, construct a bar graph that represents the number of students for each value of the assessment.

R /

1- 25 pts

1- 20 pts

5- 15 pts

19- 0 pts

Average: 4.6 pts

4. Explain how you would bring to a digital format that drew up the table in question 3.

R /

1- 25 pts

1- 15 pts

24- 0 pts

Average: 1.5 pts Average: 17.3 pts

Note: 8 students obtained 0 in all questions for a 31%

Approved students: ……….7… 27%

Failed students:…. 19….73%

Total: ………………………..26… 100%

Average score per question 1

% of passed in the test of Mathematics 1

As can be seen in the exposed graphics, in the mathematics assessment there were 73% disapproved.

Of the total number of students evaluated:

• 46% did not know how to calculate%

• 31% did not know how to calculate average

• 73% did not know how to construct bar graphs

• 92% did not know how to put a bar graph into digital format

• 31% of students did not they answered no questions

Conclusions:

Students who enter to study in the career of Psychology do not have the necessary preparation to understand the elementary calculations of a statistical analysis.

Recommendations:

Carry out a rearrangement of the subjects of the Psychology career ensuring that the statistical subject is taught before Research Methodology I and II and that the first chapters of Statistics (first meeting) are dedicated to reaffirming basic concepts of mathematics for the better understanding of the subject.

Bibliography:

Enrique Javier Diez Gutiérrez. Curricular Design of Social Guarantee. Pedagogical Editions. University of León, Spain. 1995. 144 pages

Bautista García-Vera, Antonio. Curriculum programming and evaluation. Madrid: Ed. Morata, 1994.

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Fonseca Pérez, Juan José. A model for the conception, organization and evaluation of the curricular design in the transformation of the basic secondary. Santiago de Cuba, 1999. __ (TG-715)

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Stenhouse, Lawrence. Investigation and development of curriculum. Madrid: Ed. Morata, 1994.

Torres, Jurgo. Globalization and interdisciplinarity: the integrated curriculum. Spain: Ed. Morata, 1994.

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