IB Psychology – A Student’s Guide

IB Psychology – A Student’s Guide

IB Psychology – A Student’s Guide by Travis Dixon

“I’m drowning in IB Psychology.”

We hear this all the time from teachers and students, which is why we’ve published a textbook to make your life a lot easier.

By drastically reducing the content requirements of the course through the themantic approach that finds overlaps between topics, the pressure of the course is reduced, so you get more time and less stress.

For example, there’s no need to study Social identity theory (SIT) and prejudice as two separate topics. Why not teach SIT as the explanation for prejudice? Voila! Two topics – half the time.

Similarly, why study effects of hormones (bio approach) and explanations of disorders (abnormal psych) as two separate topics? If we teach the effects of hormones on the brain as an explanation of the symptoms of PTSD – bingo! Two topics – half the time.

Besides this unique structure, more features of the text include:

• Full chapters on the IA and exam preparation
• EE advice and guidance
• Lesson-by-lesson layout for easy planning
• Guiding questions, critical thinking extensions and interesting activity suggestions for every lesson
• Full colour design with images and graphics
• Topics covered in-depth to increase IB marks for students
• Clear language and explanations for easy comprehension for EAL (and all) students
• Complete glossary with definitions of over 400 key terms
• Interesting topics not included in other books, like ‘Love and Marriage’
• Free support through our blog and Facebook groups

A lot of experienced teachers recommend that the best way to teach IB Psychology is holistically, through integrating the three approaches and the options. This is only textbook that we know of that has been designed specifically for this approach.

From Paul Wright, an IB Psychology teacher in Taiwan who has adopted the themantic textbook in his class:
“The book gives an exciting and a fresh approach to teaching IB Psychology that is enjoyable to both teachers and students.
I’m so glad that this book is now available. Too often books are poorly designed, uninspiring and overwhelming. Thank you for identifying the problem and providing a solution.
The book addresses the weaknesses of many students and that is application and critical thinking. Right from the off, the book helps students develop independent thought as well as being able to apply research to given scenarios making the content engaging and enjoyable – great work!”

From Travis, the author:

“I began writing this book because some IB Psychology textbooks I’ve used in the past have easy to follow language and structure, but poor content, and others have excellent content, but inaccessible language and ineffective structure. I wanted my students to have the best of both worlds, so I wrote this for my own students to have the entire IB Psychology course in their hands, with lessons from start to finish. This would give me more time for other things like planning engaging lessons.”

*This textbook is for the new syllabus (first exams May 2019) and supports the human relationships and abnormal psychology options, with some developmental as a bonus. Health Psychology materials will be published separately.

Travis Dixon – Themantic Education