INTRODUCTORY PSYCHOLOGY TEACHING PRIMER Early Career ...

Chapter 1: Introduction
Regan A. R. Gurung
University of Wisconsin – Green Bay
You have to teach the introductory psychology course for the very first time and
have a finite and limited amount of time to do so.
How do you begin? What do you need?
This primer is designed to answer these questions. If you are a graduate student
or new faculty member approaching this course for the very first time, we have
something for you.
Introductory psychology is perhaps one of the most difficult courses to teach within the psychology
curriculum. Not only does it involve covering the breath of the discipline, something that instructors
trained in specific areas are not naturally prepared to do, it also involves teaching students who
vary in interests and who lack proficiency in essential skills such as quantitative and informational
literacy. Many students take the introductory psychology course primarily to satisfy general
education requirements, and only a portion of students carry on to major in psychology. Unlike
students in upper level psychology classes, intro students have had little, if any, prior exposure to
psychology. Given the importance of the introductory psychology class in American education
(approximately 1.7 million students take this class every year) it is perhaps prudent for the
premier organization for the teaching of psychology, the Society of the Teaching of Psychology
(STP), to provide guidelines for this course and prepare an explicit statement to aid teachers of
this course. STP’s Executive Committee charged the Early Career Psychologists group to create a
primer to aid those teaching introductory psychology. This document is the result of their labors.
Corresponding to the magnitude of the task of teaching the introductory course, there are many
resources to teach the class. STP’s own resources (OTRP, Project Syllabus, TOPIX) and issues of
Teaching of Psychology, together with many volumes on teaching the class (e.g., Dunn & Chew,
2005; Dunn et al., 2010; Goss Lucas & Bernstein, 2005) provide a variety of activities and
assignments to aid the intro psychology teacher. Unfortunately, the volume of help available
paradoxically may frustrate the novice teacher. Many graduate students, adjunct instructors,
lecturers, and even junior faculty, are often thrust into teaching the introductory course with
insufficient training, time, or both. When added to already challenging work schedules and the
stressors of the academic life, the novice introductory psychology teacher may be overwhelmed
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