| Unit name | An Introduction to Study in the Social Sciences |
|---|---|
| Unit code | SPAI10007 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | C/4 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12) |
| Unit director | Dr. John McTague |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies |
| Faculty | Faculty of Social Sciences and Law |
This unit aims to introduce students to the skills required for studying the social sciences within the foundation programme, and (ultimately) at undergraduate level, and to the range of disciplines available within the Faculty of Social Sciences and Law at Bristol. There will be opportunities for students to discuss issues related to the transition to higher education and/or returning to study and the process for progression beyond the foundation programme.
The unit aims to help students operate with self-confidence in a variety of university environments, including those with which they are initially unfamiliar, using a range of relevant skills for self-directed study, including those particularly relevant to study in the social sciences. The unit will also include sessions which would introduce participants to the key areas of study, contemporary debates, and general problematique of the fields in which the Faculty’s staff are active – in Sociology, Education, Law, Politics & IR, Social Policy, Childhood Studies, Criminology, Economics, Management, and Finance. This will allow students to connect the practical skills they are acquiring to both a larger conceptual sense of the purpose of studying social science, and the potential ‘value’ to their own lives and livelihoods of developing a specialism in one such subject area as part of degree study.
Students will be asked to complete a range of practical tasks in their own time and will have opportunities to reflect on this work in seminars; the unit is thus intended to help students familiarize themselves with the balance there will be in other units between work completed independently and during contact time.
Topics covered may vary from year to year, but would normally include: classroom-based skills such as note-taking, formulating and asking questions, participation & active engagement; self-study and research-related skills such as library use, identifying appropriate/inappropriate sources; skills relating to the processing of information discovered in the research process such as wide reading and reading in depth, how to identify perspectives and arguments, how to interpret basic quantitative data, read and understanding basic statistics (frequencies/averages, etc.) from tables/charts/graphs, and work productively with high volumes of complex information; numeracy skills including using percentages and ratios, understanding the concept of number and variable in basic algebra; and skills relating to the demonstration of knowledge verbally and in writing such as formulating an argument, and structuring an essay or presentation. There will also be a session on time-management – how to be strategic and maximise the impact of time spent in discovering, processing, and expressing knowledge in the context of a busy university schedule.
On successful completion of this unit, students will be able to:
The unit will be predominantly taught in seminars, with an emphasis on small-group discussions, and some sessions will take the form of lectures. There will be 2 x two hour sessions per week. Where appropriate, some lectures will be delivered to students on this unit alongside students studying on other Foundation pathways (i.e. Arts and Humanities).
One 4,000-word summative portfolio (100%) [ILOs 1-6]
This unit will be assessed on a pass/fail basis.
Students will be required to submit a portfolio of work at the end of the unit, demonstrating their engagement with the tasks set week-to-week and reflecting on what they have learnt. The portfolio would normally be 4,000 words of reflective writing in total plus associated notes or materials. The reflective nature of these tasks is designed to help students develop confidence as well as skills relevant to study in the social sciences and to place what they are learning in the context of their own transition to higher education. In the tasks students will not only be asked to demonstrate what they have learnt but also to reflect on the different ways in which they are learning, e.g. including through reflection on their own contributions in seminars.
The exact nature of the tasks set may vary from year to year, but these might normally include asking students to reflect on skills such as time management and taking notes in lectures, demonstrating their awareness of how the skills they are learning have allowed them to engage with various intellectual debates in the social sciences and/or how these skills may be relevant beyond the course.
