The mission of the APA Summit on High School Psychology Education was to create the best future for high school psychology education. During the summit, participants worked in eight separate working groups, each looking at an issue important in high school psychology education. Each group was tasked with discussing their area of focus, producing teaching resources or other materials to support the mission of the summit, and making recommendations for specific audiences, such as teachers, administrators and APA. Below is a summary of the work of each working group and expected deliverables.
Strand 1: Psychology is Science
Co-chairs Charlie Blair-Broeker and Kristin H. Whitlock
Psychology is a science. However, there are those who still question whether psychology fits among the other sciences. This may be because they do not understand that psychology employs an array of scientific research and statistical techniques in its study of the mind and behavior. This misperception has impacted how high school psychology courses are treated. For example, psychology is rarely offered for science credit counted for high school graduation. There is a divide between the state of the discipline (as a science) and how it is addressed in schools (as a social studies elective). In response to these concerns, this working group created a document providing a clear rationale for the inclusion of psychology with the other sciences. The group explained the scientific nature of psychology and clarified commonly held misperceptions. This document will be available by mid-spring 2018. In addition, the group identified many of the scientific organizations that recognize psychological science and is currently in the process of creating lab exemplars for high school teachers illustrating how to incorporate science-based lab activities into the high school course.
Strand 2: Skills That Promote Well-Being and Flourishing
Co-chairs Randy Ernst and Elizabeth Hammer
The high school psychology course is an ideal place for teaching students’ skills such as metacognition, resilience, optimism and grit. This working group identified three sets of skills that should be included in every high school psychology course: metacognitive skills are those that help students with their ability to plan, monitor and evaluate their learning processes (e.g., “study” skills); transferable skills are those that transfer from the classroom to other aspects of life such as work or college (e.g., “soft skills,” such as cooperation); and well-being skills are those that allow students to flourish (e.g., gratitude). Flourishing skills are not well represented in high school psychology textbooks even though these skills will allow students to connect the science of psychology to their everyday lives. The working group’s deliverables included activities across the three skill subsets, including lessons on time management, integrity and honesty, decision making in career exploration, gratitude and resilience; an exam wrapper and discussion prompts on metacognition and a metacognition assignment revision tool; and online resources for understanding, teaching and assessing transferable skills. These deliverables will be released in 2018.
Strand 3: National Standards for High School Psychology Curricula
Co-chairs Amy Fineburg and Tina Athanasopoulos
The National Standards for High School Psychology Curricula defines learning benchmarks for the high school psychology course and is arguably the most important document supporting high school psychology education. The current version of the National Standards will expire in 2021. This working group focused on how to align APA’s National Standards to the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) and an APA report (PDF, 221KB) that provided recommendations for introductory psychology. Working group members focused on aligning psychology to science practices and the cross-cutting themes from the NGSS; this integration will help get the teaching of psychological science accepted by the larger science community. The working group also produced a new proposed framework for the National Standards based on APA's Guidelines for the Undergraduate Psychology Major (PDF, 447KB) and created a template for the new standards model using the personality unit. The sample standards template shows how new standards could be developed using the science and engineering practices in the NGSS and two APA reports on introductory psychology. These documents will be provided to the next working group charged with developing the next revision of the standards over the next three years.
Strand 4: Assessing Student Knowledge and Skills in Psychology
Co-chairs Regan Gurung and Rob McEntarffer
It is difficult if not impossible to gain a picture of what students are learning without using valid and robust assessment tools and practices. This working group developed three major pragmatic tools. A “Teachers’ Guide to Assessment” serves to demystify the process of assessment, showing why it is important, what good assessment entails and how to do it. A “Best Practices for Assessing Pedagogy” document helps teachers conduct action research and use the tools of the scholarship of teaching and learning to test new innovations or interventions to improve teaching and learning. The strand also developed a “gold standard template” for assessment exemplars. The template and exemplars will be used to shape assessments of activities, demonstrations and any tests of knowledge. The exemplars will also assist psychology teachers by providing “ready-to-use” measures within the classroom in the form of: a) student products; b) teacher led activity with assessment; c) essays or short answers; and/or d) multiple choice questions. These resources will be published by the spring of 2018.
Strand 5: Credentialing and Identifying the High School Psychology Teacher
Co-chairs Ken Weaver and Debra Park
This working group focused on credentialing and identifying the high school psychology teacher. By the conclusion of the summit, the working group completed three deliverables. The first is a recommended grant proposal to obtain funding to conduct a national census of high school psychology teachers to include high schools located in US territories and military installations. The census will be used to produce a national database of high school psychology teachers. The second deliverable is an Advocacy Toolkit for the Psychology Teaching Credential to support the efforts and leadership of advocates who champion having a psychology teaching credential that is required to teach the high school psychology course. The third deliverable is a set of talking points to be used to advocate for psychology as a science course. These deliverables are aimed to strengthen and expand high school psychology teacher professional identity through the credentialing process and the development of stronger professional networks. This will better ensure that high school students will receive an education embedded in science. The latter two deliverables will be available between the spring and fall of 2018.
Strand 6: Ongoing Professional Development
Co-chairs Daria Schaffeld and Steven Turner
This working group concentrated on strengthening the value of psychological science by creating a variety of professional development tools. Deliverables included a listing of yearly professional development opportunities such as conferences, workshops and regional networks for psychology teachers; a Regional Network Toolkit outlining steps for starting a successful regional teaching network; a "Psychology Teachers: Where Can I Get Help?" document containing answers for many frequently asked questions and resources to help teachers gain content knowledge for instruction; and a resource vetting instrument (PDF, 48KB) that will help teachers determine the academic impact of any activity or demonstration. These first four deliverables will all be online by early 2018. Other deliverables included a listing of research articles for each Standard Area from the APA National Standards to help teachers find further information based on research to build a stronger course and a recommendation to hold an additional extended workshop based on the existing APA/Clark University workshop in a different region of the country.
Strand 7: Diversity and Access
Co-chairs Yadira Sánchez and Tammy Hughes
Diversity and access are major topics of discussion in education and in the discipline of psychology. To address diversity and access in the classroom four goals were prioritized: (1) How to identify methods and strategies for teachers to increase their students' sensitivities and awareness. (2) How to attract and retain a diverse teaching faculty among high school psychology teachers. (3) How to engage in key initiatives to encourage diverse high school students to pursue the study of psychology. And (4) How to highlight the importance of diversity issues to the public. To start, the working group developed a self-reflection tool for psychology teachers to help diversify their classrooms and school environments and has started collecting diversity resources. (If you have any resources to share please send them to Yadira Sánchez, PhD, or Tammy Hughes, PhD. They welcome your input.) The working group also developed action plans for recruiting diverse faculty and students into psychology. These deliverables will be available between the spring and fall of 2018.
Strand 8: Technology and Online Learning
Co-chairs Ladonna Lewis and Brad Wray
This working group discussed the various technologies available to enhance the teaching of high school psychology for face-to-face and online courses. This group produced two main deliverables. An online Canvas course will provide teachers with a pre-packaged starter course for introductory psychology. The course will include many content specific resources as well as formative assessments all organized by the National Standards for High School Psychology Curricula. The entire course will be shareable and customizable. The Canvas course should be launched by the spring of 2018. The group also created a document designed to share best practices in the use of technology for high school psychology teachers, including exemplar tools, apps and examples on how to use tools to enhance teaching and learning to be posted online by early 2018.