AP Psychology Syllabus

Prerequisites: None
Class: Sundays 1:30-5:00pm at MIT
Office Hours: on appointment.
Instructor: Brandon Moore (bmoore@mit.edu)
Course Description: (courtesy of College Board)
“The AP Psychology course is designed to introduce students to the systematic and scientific study of the
behavior and mental processes of human beings and other animals. Students are exposed to the psychological
facts, principles, and phenomena associated with each of the major subfields within psychology. They also
learn about the ethics and methods psychologists use in their science and practice.”
Behavior Expectations:
The success of this class depends on the active participation of all students. There will be discussion in class
every week, so you should do the reading assignments for that week BEFORE you come to class. Needless
to say, if you do not attend class, it is impossible for you to contribute to it (or get anything out of it.)
Three and a half hours is a long time to sit and pay attention each week. There will be a short break halfway
through class each week. You may bring food and drink, as long as it is not disruptive and you clean up
after yourselves. If you abuse this,you will no longer be allowed to bring food to class.
NO CELL PHONES. If you must bring them to class, you need to put them on silent or turn them off.
You may use your cell phone during the break only. If I see cell phones out during class, I will confiscate
them until the end of the day. Im not kidding.
Absences:
It is important to come to class. I will be taking attendance at the beginning of each class as per Delve
policy. If you need to miss a week for some reason (family emergency, illness, etc.), please email me ahead
of time if at all possible.
Assignments:
Although they are not going to be graded, I have added some assignments to the class. These assignments
are intended to give you a chance to review and reinforce the material learned in class, as well as to give you
experience with things you would be expected to do in college.
With each chapter assigned in the textbooks, I will give you reading questions. Although I will not be
collecting or grading these, I will be asking those same questions the next class for discussion and I expect
you to be able to answer them.
I will also ask you to do two special projects (the first in late November/early December and the second in
late March/early April.) For each of these, you will be giving a presentation on one of the topics that will
be currently discussed. You will be required to research the topic and present the information that you have
learned in a creative way. Examples of projects would be to make a poster with a short talk, a mini-lecture,
a video presentation (such as a documentary), etc. The presentations will be approximately 5-10 minutes.
This project will be explained in detail in class.
Finally, we will have a midterm and a final exam. Again, this is for your benefit. It is to give you some
experience testing before the AP exam in May. The midterm will be multiple-choice or short answer and
cover the material learned in the first half of the course. The final will be a full-length practice exam and
will cover the whole years worth of material. We will also have some review days at the end of the year
before the AP Exam.

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Grading:
Grading will be very relaxed in this class. The grade will be a good tool to gauge your progress as the year
goes on. The projects will each be worth 15% of your grade, the midterm will be worth 30% of your grade,
and the final will be worth 40% of your grade. Reading assignments will not be graded but should still be
done.
Textbook:
We will be using Psychology by David Meyers, 8th ed. for this class.
It is essential that you do the reading before you come to class.
The AP Exam: (courtesy of College Board)
“The AP Psychology Exam includes a 70-minute multiple-choice section that accounts for two-thirds of the
exam grade and a 50-minute free-response section made up of two questions that accounts for one third of
the exam grade. Students often ask whether they should guess on the multiple-choice questions. Hap-hazard
or random guessing is unlikely to improve scores because one-fourth of the number of questions answered
incorrectly will be subtracted from the number of questions answered correctly. However, students who have
some knowledge of a question and can eliminate one or more answer choices will usually find it advantageous
to guess from among the remaining choices. Free-response questions are an appropriate tool for evaluating
a students mastery of scientific research principles and ability to make connections among construts from
different psychological domains (e.g. development, personality, learning). Students may be asked to analyze
a general problem in psychology (e.g. depression, adaptation) using concepts from different theoretical
frameworks or subdomains in the field, or to design, analyze, or critique a research study.”
The AP Psychology exam this year will be held on Tuesday, May 12 in the afternoon.

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Class Schedule:
Date Class Title Assigned Reading
September 14 Introduction to AP Psychology, Ethics, and Basic Statistics
September 21 Methods, Approaches and History of Psychology Ch.1
September 28 Biological Basis of Behavior Ch.2
October 5 NO CLASS - Columbus Day Weekend
October 12 Biological Basis of Behavior (cont.) Ch.2
October 19 Sensation and Perception Ch.5
October 26 Sensation and Perception (cont.) Ch.6
November 2 Sensation and Perception (cont.) Ch.6
November 9 States of Consciousness Ch.7
November 16 Midterm Review
November 23 NO CLASS - Thanksgiving
November 30 Midterm EXAM
December 7 Project I Presentations
December 14 NO CLASS - MIT Finals Week
December 21 NO CLASS - Winter Vacation
December 28 NO CLASS - Winter Vacation
January 4 Learning Ch.8
January 11 Cognition: Memory Ch.9
January 18 CognitionL Thinking and Language Ch.10
January 25 Motivation Ch.12
February 1 Emotion Ch.13
February 8 Developmental Psychology Ch.3
February 15 Developmental Psychology (cont.) Ch.4
February 22 Personality Theory Ch.15
March 1 Testing and Individual Differences Ch.11
March 8 Abnormal Psychology Ch.14
March 15 Abnormal Psychology (cont.) Ch.16
March 22 Diseases of the Nervous System
March 29 NO CLASS - MIT Spring Break
April 5 Treatment of Psychological Disorders Ch.17
April 12 Project II Presentations
April 19 Social Psychology Ch.18
April 26 Review for Final Exam (AP Practice Exam)
May 3 Final Exam
May 10 Review and Special Topics
May 12 AP EXAM DAY (afternoon)