Child & Adolescent Mental Health FdSc

Teaching

You are taught through a combination of interactive and experiential workshops, seminars and lectures. Application of learning takes place through your experiences, discussion and both individual and group activities.

In addition, meetings with your personal academic tutor will be scheduled regularly throughout your course of study. This will provide you with opportunities to think with your tutor about both your academic and personal development in relation to the course, your placement experience and your future career plans.

Contact time

In a typical week, you will have around 7 contact hours of direct teaching. The course is structured so that all direct teaching takes place on one day per week during semesters. This is to allow time for your course placement activity, which equates to 25% of the course (a minimum of 200 hours per academic year). You could be in an agreed placement setting or using your employment, if appropriate, for the purposes of the course. During your placement practice, an identified mentor in the setting will supervise you and further guide and support your learning. This opportunity will also enable you to link theory to practice.

Typically, class contact time will be structured around a combination of large group lectures and seminars/workshops for the taught modules, together with a 'writing retreat' at The Hive once per semester. Your module leads, personal academic tutors and The Hive staff will support your learning.

Independent self-study

In addition to the contact time, you are expected to undertake around 22 hours of personal self-study per week. Typically, this will involve completing online activities, reading journal articles and books, working on individual and group projects, undertaking research in the library and online, preparing coursework assignments and presentations, as well as preparing for examinations.

A range of excellent learning facilities, including the Hive and library resources, the virtual learning environment, and extensive electronic learning resources, supports independent learning.

Assessment

The course provides opportunities to test understanding and learning informally through the completion of practice or 'formative' assignments. Each module has one or more formal or 'summative' assessments, which are graded and count towards the overall module grade.

Assessment methods include:

• Presentations both individually and in groups
• Written essays
• Role plays
• Poster presentations
• Accomplishment of core practice outcomes within the work-based learning modules

All of the modules on the FdSc CAMH are mandatory and a typical formal summative assessment pattern for each year of the course is as follows:

Year 1: Role-play, group presentation, essays both observational and reflective. Accomplishment of core practice outcomes within the work-based learning module.

Year 2: Presentations, production of a media item in a group, essays and a report. Oral presentation and poster presentation. Accomplishment of core practice outcomes within the work-based learning module.

Feedback

You will receive feedback on practice assessments and formal assessments undertaken. Feedback supports learning and you are encouraged to discuss it with personal academic tutors and module tutors as appropriate.

We aim to provide you with feedback on formal course work assessments within 20 working days of hand-in.