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Investigate behavior in this three-week psychology course for elementary and middle school students on Cornell University’s campus.
Course Description
A habit, a memory, or a burst of emotion can become a question about the mind. Models, games, and creative projects give your student ways to investigate.
In this course your student will build a brain model, compare psychology myths with evidence, and try a game showing how repeated experiences can shape a learned response. Major theories introduce ways of explaining thought and behavior. A lifespan timeline explores development, while emotion charades and nature-versus-nurture discussions connect biology, experience, and social situations.
Making a stress ball and exploring calm-down tools bring ideas about stress into everyday view; the course is not therapy. Age-appropriate discussion introduces mental health and common psychological disorders, alongside uses of psychology in schools, sports, counseling, and other settings.
Mini case-study skits ask teams to apply what they’ve learned to realistic situations. For a final project, your student will choose a real-life question and explain it through art, a skit, video, or a short presentation. There’s room to be creative while looking for evidence behind an explanation.
This three-week Summer Discovery course for elementary and middle school students takes place on Cornell University’s campus in Ithaca, New York. Beyond class, students connect academic exploration with campus life, new friendships, growing independence, and curiosity they can keep exploring.
What Will You Do?
• Build a brain model and compare psychology myths with evidence
• Explore simplified ideas from major psychological theories
• Test learning and conditioning concepts through an interactive game
• Examine development, emotion, social behavior, and nature versus nurture
• Discuss stress, mental health, and psychological disorders at an age-appropriate level
• Present a real-life psychology question through art, video, skit, or slides
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course, students will be able to:
• Explain connections between the brain, behavior, emotions, and development
• Use psychological ideas to explain an age-appropriate everyday situation
• Support an explanation about behavior with evidence rather than assumptions
You’ll leave with your final psychology project.
Why Psychology Skills Matter
Psychology asks students to connect an observation with a possible explanation, then consider what evidence would support it. A model, a case discussion, or a game can make an idea visible enough to question. Comparing explanations helps students recognize the limits of a first impression.
The course also introduces different ways to think about development, emotions, and social behavior. Discussing those ideas respectfully gives students practice listening and considering another person’s perspective. A creative final project requires them to explain their thinking clearly. Those habits can support reading, classroom discussion, collaborative work, and further questions about people and the mind.
Who Should Attend?
For students who have completed 5th, 6th, 7th, or 8th grade.
If you wonder why habits stick, how the brain works, or why people respond differently to a situation, this course offers several ways to explore. You’ll work through ideas in discussion, games, models, and a creative project about a question you choose. Students should be ready to listen respectfully, consider evidence, and explain an idea to classmates. Age-appropriate conversations include stress, mental health, and psychological disorders. These are topics for academic exploration through the course’s activities and examples.
Psychology in Action
Psychology can help frame questions about learning, emotions, development, and behavior. A teacher might ask how students learn a new skill, while a researcher might investigate how experience influences a habit. Different settings require different evidence and an explanation suited to the question.
Students try several ways of examining those questions through models, games, case discussions, and a final project. They might continue exploring the brain, look more closely at how a character behaves, or investigate an everyday question about motivation or emotion. The course offers a starting point for asking how an explanation could be tested.
After successfully finishing this course, you will be awarded a certification completion for your accomplishment.
*This is a preview, not what you will receive