Sensation, Perception, and Consciousness

Sensation, Perception, and Consciousness

PSYCHOLOGY

(SECONDARY)

ESSENTIAL UNIT 3 (E03)

(Sensation, Perception, and Consciousness)

(June 2017)

Unit Statement: The student will learn how sensory inputs are perceived. The student will also learn what consciousness is, and how it is represented at various stages, such as during the sleep cycle, dreams, hypnosis, and while affected by psychoactive drugs.

Essential Outcomes: (assessed for mastery)

  1. The Student Will recognize the basic principles of sensory transduction, including absolute threshold, difference threshold, signal detection, and sensory adaptation. [4.1]
  1. TSW explain the sensory processes (e.g., hearing, vision, touch, taste, smell, vestibular, kinesthesis, pain), including relevant anatomical structures, and specialized pathways in the brain for each of the senses. [4.2 - 4.4]
  1. TSW describe general principles of organizing and integrating sensation to promote stable awareness of the external world (e.g., Rules of Perceptual Organization, Movement, Gestalt principles, Depth Perception). [4.5]
  1. TSW summarize how personal experience and culture can influence perceptual processes (e.g., perceptual set, context effects). [4.5]
  1. TSW describe various states of consciousness and their impact on behavior. [5.1]
  1. TSW discuss the the stages and characteristics of the sleep cycle and the theories of why humans sleep and dream. [5.2]
  1. TSW discriminate between actual contemporary uses of hypnosis and common myths [5.3].

Introduced/Practiced/Ongoing Skills: (not assessed)

  1. The Student Will initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions.
  1. TSW create and apply strategies for understanding assigned readings, determining or clarifying the meaning of unknown and multi-meaning words and phrases.
  1. TSW develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, and rewriting his or her work.
  2. TSW explain why psychoactive drugs are addicting [5.4]

Suggested Materials:

Social Studies Psychology, Houghton-Mifflin Harcourt, 2018. Chapters 4 and 5

Technology Links:

(1) Mighty Optical Illusions -

(2) It’s ‘digital heroin’: How screens turn kids into psychotic junkies-

(3) Crash Course Psychology #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, #10

(4) Two minute neuroscience -

(5) Gestalt Principles -

(6) Assumptions -

(7) Selective Attention Test -

(8) The Other Big Deficit: Many Teens Fall Short On Sleep -

(9) Speed Drawing【15】- How to draw 3D ART - 3D -

(10) Johann Hari - TED talk addiction RE rat park -

Key Terms

sensation / perception / Absolute threshold / Difference threshold
Sensory adaptation / Signal-detection theory / pupil / lens
retina / photoreceptors / Blind spot / Visual acuity
afterimage / cochlea / Auditory nerve / Conductive deafness
Sensorineural deafness / Olfactory nerve / Gate theory / Vestibular sense
kinesthesis / closure / proximity / Common fate
Stroboscopic motion / Monocular cues / Binocular cues / Retinal disparity
consciousness / Selective attention / preconscious / unconscious
nonconscious / Altered state of consciousness / Circadian rhythm / Rapid-eye movement sleep
insomnia / Night terror / Sleep apnea / narcolepsy
meditation / biofeedback / hypnosis / Posthypnotic suggestion

Suggested Assessment Tools and Strategies:

  1. Teacher-generated or publisher provided tests and written assignments.
  2. Teacher observation and student participation in classroom activities.
  3. Students draw and label the parts of the eye and the visual pathway
  4. Students draw and label the parts of the ear and the auditory pathway
  5. Students create stories, alone or in groups, using elements from the chapter -- e.g. the parts of the ear--as a memory device:

e.g. A guy is in a gondola on a canal of sound waves. He goes under a big, round archway (pinna) and sees a band playing up ahead. They are called the EHAS band-- first, is a guy banging away on the drums (Eardrums), next to him is a guy using a Hammer to make noise on an Anvil. Next to them is a cowboy, with spurs on his boots (Stirrup) playing a guitar. Oddly, sitting next to them is a really drunk snail (cochlea). He is full of liquid. He seems a bit dazed and confused and says to the guy in the gondola, “hey, man, what’s it all mean??” As he turns to go find out from the manager upstairs (the brain) he leaves behind a trail of electrochemical slime.

  1. Collaborate with the art teacher to help students create a visual illusion. Then have students explain what principles of perception apply.
  2. Conduct the “Sensory Threshold and Perceptual Organization Lab” in the textbook and hold the discussions.
  3. Have students keep a dream journal and then interpret their dreams based on the various theories.
  4. Conduct a Socratic Seminar on Dream Theories.
  5. Have students create Venn diagram and/or essay comparing the addictive properties of psychoactive drugs to excessive technology usage, shopping, gambling, or eating.
  6. Have students research the opposing theories that exist in the field of psychology concerning dream theories, hypnosis and/or drug addition and

RUBRIC FOUND ON FOLLOWING PAGES………………………

PSYCHOLOGY

Suggested Unit (E03) Rubric:

Name ______Class______Date ______

● All TSW’s must be mastered for a ‘B’.

● 3 out of 5 A-level blocks should be met for an ‘A’. When there are multiple descriptions written for an A, students to not need to do everyone.

● This rubric was created using many of the suggested assessments listed above. If teachers use different assessments, then teachers should create their own rubrics. Teachers may choose to use their own rubrics; however, all TSW’s must be assessed. Teachers should remember that even at the ‘B’ level, students are expected to be able to produce work independently or display engagement with the material. Copying a list or definition from a book should not be considered mastery of an outcome. To display mastery at the ‘A’ level, the student is expected to exhibit higher order thinking skills. The student must independently assess, evaluate, interpret, or infer, rather than repeat a memorized response.

TSW / A / B / Comments
1.) The Student Will recognize the basic principles of sensory transduction, including absolute threshold, difference threshold, signal detection, and sensory adaptation. [4.1] / Students can discuss the relationship between the absolute threshold and the difference threshold. / The students is able to match the absolute threshold for each of the 5 senses.
Students can give an example of the difference threshold and of sensory adaptation.
Students can give an example of a factor that might affect whether or not a sensory signal is detected
2.) TSW explain the sensory processes (e.g., hearing, vision, touch, taste, smell, vestibular, kinesthesis, pain), including relevant anatomical structures, and specialized pathways in the brain for each of the senses. [4.2 - 4.4] / Students can compare and contrast two of the sense processes using correct anatomical structures and and specialized pathways to the brain.. / The student is able to complete a cloze style paragraph for the sensory processes given the appropriate vocabulary as choices.
3.) TSW describe general principles of organizing and integrating sensation to promote stable awareness of the external world (e.g., Rules of Perceptual Organization, Movement, Gestalt principles, Depth Perception). [4.5] / The student creates a optical illusion and then describes how the brain integrates the sensory information to see what it sees.
(This could also include personal experience and cultural influences) / The student is able to give an example of how the brain uses rules of perceptual organization, movement, gestalt principles, and depth perception to create a stable awareness of the external world.
4.) TSW summarize how personal experience and culture can influence perceptual processes (e.g., perceptual set, context effects). [4.5] / The student can give an example of how their personal experience influences what they see or hear.
5.) TSW describe various states of consciousness and their impact on behavior. [5.1] / The student can match a description of a behavior to the state of consciousness
6.) TSW discuss the the stages and characteristics of the sleep cycle and the theories of why humans sleep and dream. [5.2] / The student can discuss the two main hypothesis for why humans dream and can defend one of those hypotheses with scientific evidence. / The student can answer questions about the stages and characteristics of sleep.
The student discusses two many dream theories
7.) TSW discriminate between actual contemporary uses of hypnosis and common myths [5.3]. / The student can discuss the two main hypothesis for how hypnosis works and can defend one of those hypotheses with scientific evidence. / The student can sort actual contemporary uses of hypnosis from and common myths.

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