EXAMS, ASSIGNMENTS & DUE DATES
Sociology 2500 – Deviance, Conformity & Social Control
Individual Assignments
There will be 3 individual assignments for this course. 2 of these assignments are worth 15% each and the other is worth 5% of your final mark.
Assignments must be submitted to Moodle, on or before the due dates. Emailed or late assignments will not be accepted.
Assignment due dates:
Individual Assignment 1: Due May 17th
Individual Assignment 2: Due June 12th**
though assignment 2 is due June 12th, you must start it no later than May 11th
Individual Assignment 3: Due June 15th
Group Presentation
All students will be assigned to a group. You will work as a group to prepare and deliver a presentation via Zoom. The group presentation is worth 20% of your final mark. Marks will come from a combination of evaluations by the instructor and from other students in the class. (If you’d like to see the marking rubrics that will be used, they can be found on Moodle in Assignment 3)
Presentation due dates:
All presentations will take place on June 1st & 2nd
The instructor will host a presentation info session via Zoom on May 8th to provide more info about what is expected for the presenations & the technology required. All students need to attend this info session. A few minutes prior to this session starting, please click HERE.
After the info session, the instructor will assign groups & you can sign up via Google Docs (link below). There are multiple time options & sign up will be on a first-come, first-served basis.
SIGN UP LINK (Do not sign up until you have been assigned to a group & have discussed days/times with your group members)
All presentations will be recorded by the instructor and will be watched by other students (to be used in assignment 3).
Exams
There are 3 exams for this course. Exam questions come from texbook content and application. Each exam is worth a total of 15% of your final mark. Exams will consist of 50 multiple choice questions each; questions will be worth 2 marks each. You will have 1 hour to complete each exam.
Students will not have the exact same exam as each other because the 50 questions will be pulled randomly for each student from a larger bank of questions.
Exams will be done on Moodle from your own home, NOT in the testing centre.
Exam dates:
Exam 1 (Chapters 1, 2, 3): May 13th (available from 4am – 11:59pm)
Exam 2 (Chapters 4, 5, 6, 7): May 25th (available from 4am – 11:59pm)
Exam 3 (Chapters 8, 9, 10): June 18th (available from 4am – 11:59pm)
You must complete the exam within the timeframe indicated on each exam date. Students will not be permitted to write the exam on any day other than as indicated above.
Individual Assignment 1
TED TALK: How to Motivate Yourself to Change Your Behavior – Tali Sharot
This Ted talk discusses how people tend to respond better to positive information than negative (ex: stop smoking campaigns vs the benefits if they quit.)
1) Discuss how this video relates to social control (formal & informal)
2) Provide 2 examples of formal or informal social control (not from the video) that could be changed to be more aligned with the message in the Ted Talk. Explain how/why they need to be changed in order to align with the message.
3) Provide 2 examples of formal or informal social control (not from the video) that are already aligned with the message in the Ted Talk. Explain how/why they are already aligned with this message.
Assignment should be well written (easy to follow, free of spelling errors, grammar issues, run-on sentences etc). Assignment should also be presented in a format that is easy to see that all questions have been thoroughly answered.
The breakdown of marks for this assignment are as follows:
Question 1: /10
Question 2: /15
Question 3: /15
Grammar, Spelling, Punctuation, ease of reading: /10
TOTAL: /50 (x 2 = 100)
Individual Assignment 2
EXPERIENTIAL ASSIGNMENT
The purpose of this assignment is to have you pay closer attention to informal social controls. Many forms of social control are so subtle that we don’t even notice, yet they are everywhere. We tend to take them for granted as “just the way things are.” It is only when we look at the world through a Sociological lens that we can see the variety of influences at play.
For this assignment you will need to start paying closer attention to the subtleties of human interaction. Each day, take note of the various forms of informal social control that you witness/experience. You will be required to track weekly reflections about what you saw. You will do this each week for a total of 4 weeks and submit them as 1 document, with headings to separate week by week. Each weekly reflection must include at least 1 example of informal social control, and they must vary from week to week. You will submit a total of 4 reflections. You do not need to submit your daily notes. They are simply to help you pay more attention to the subtle (and not so subtle) influences around you and to help you get the full learning experience from this assignment.
Please be brief in your reflections and organize your answers in the format I have indicated in the example provided. Point form is encouraged. Here are the basics of what you need to cover for each week:
Where? For example: at home, at the grocery store, on a video chat, on a TV show, etc.
**With the COVID 19 Pandemic, you may be limited on what/where you can observe. Please be creative with this. You are NOT being asked to put yourself at risk. Always obey social distancing rules.
Who? For example, parent and child, yourself and spouse/friend, cashier and customer, media, advertising, etc.
What? Behaviour witnessed/experienced.
Reflections: Informal Social Control implications. For example, did it work? For good? For bad? Etc.
Assignment should be well written (easy to follow, free of spelling errors, grammar issues, run-on sentences etc). Assignment should also be presented in the same format as the example provided. It should be easy for the instructor to see that all questions have been thoroughly answered.
The breakdown of marks for this assignment are as follows:
Where: /2.5
Who: /2.5
What: /15
Reflections: /70
Grammar, Spelling, Punctuation, ease of reading: /10
TOTAL: /100
EXAMPLE:
Week 1:
Where: At the movie theater
Who: Parents and 2 children. Ages approx. 5 & 7 years old
What: Older child kept whining and asking for candy. Parents said no. Child became quite loud and obnoxious. A few movie-goers glanced at the family. Husband took child out of theatre. Came back a few minutes later with candy. Child was quiet and happy.
Reflections: There were a couple forms of informal social control at play.
1) Disapproving looks from strangers: Seems as though the glances from strangers caused the parent to remove the loud child from the area. Could teach the child that it is not ok to behave like that. Also teaches the younger child (by example) that if you misbehave, it will not be tolerated (punishment would be to miss part of the movie). Or so I thought…
2) The fact that the parent bought the child the candy after the child was misbehaving, is also a form of informal social control, but in my opinion, a negative one. It showed both children that if you misbehave long enough, you can get what you want. (so technically…did the child use informal social control on the parent, or the parent on the child? (Albeit not with the intended effect)
Individual Assignment 3
REVIEW OF GROUP PRESENTATIONS
After all of the group presentations have been completed, the recorded presentations will be available to you. Each student will be assigned 2 presentations to watch and grade.
You will also be required to evaluate yourself and your own group members.
The marking rubric that you will use for this assignment can be found on Moodle.
Group Presentation
The purpose of the group presentation is to provide the opportunity to learn from each other. It also gives students the opportunity to connect with others remotely and work together towards a common goal (Due to COVID 19 concerns, you are NOT permitted to meet in person to work on this)
Presentation Topic: You have the freedom to choose the topic, but your presentation must teach us through a sociological lens. You will be required to apply a concept from your textbook to something out in the real world (that has happened in the past or is happening right now). Be sure to research outside of the textbook in order to expand your content. The goal is NOT to simply repeat info from the text. In fact, please do not do that.
To give you an idea of what is expected, 4 topic examples are provided on the righthand side of this page. If you are unsure if the topic you have chosen is ok, you can email the instructor for feedback (but the instructor will not provide you with a topic). As long as you can show that the topic relates to the content of this class, and you can teach it through a sociological lens, then you are ok!
Presentation Length: Presentations should be 15-20 minutes in length. Anything shorter or longer will lose marks.
Presentation Format: All members of the group will meet the instructor online via Zoom to do a live presentation. You may wish to use PowerPoint but it is not mandatory. Please note that video or audio clips within a PowerPoint will not be accepted. The instructor will record the presentation.
Topic examples:
1) The text talks alot about inequality. Your group may wish to teach us about how inequality is related to eugenics and the 1928 Sterilization Act of Alberta.
2) There is a chapter in the text about Media & Mass Communications. Your group may choose to teach us about how this has influenced the way certain newsworthy info gets shared/not shared in various parts of the world.
3) The text speaks about informal and formal social control. It would be interesting to hear how these forms of social control have/have not been used thus far during the COVID 19 pandemic.
4) The text discusses the term ‘sick role’. How might this be applicable right now during the COVID 19 pandemic? You could also look at how it might vary from one socio-economic class to another.
OPTIONAL: FOR YOUR OWN LEARNING…
The following are recommendations to enhance your learning, but are NOT requirements of the course
TED TALK: Poverty Isn’t a Lack of Character; it’s a Lack of Cash – Rutger Bregman
- What sociological perspective/theory does this Ted Talk resonate with? Explain & provide examples to support your explanation.
- From the sociological perspective that you indicate in question 1, explain why the proposed solution to poverty would work?
- From a sociological perspective different from the one used in questions 1 & 2 above, explain why the proposed solution to poverty would not work.
TED TALK: The Hidden Influence of Social Networks – Nicholas Christakis
1. How does this Ted Talk relate to what you have learned in your textbook? Explain and provide examples to support your explanation.
2. The presenter says “Our experience of the world depends on the actual structure of the networks in which we are residing and on all the kinds of things that ripple and flow through the network.
- Explain what he means by this.
- In a couple of sentences for each, apply this meaning (explain & provide examples) to the experience of:
- A criminal
- A stay at home father
- A single, unmarried 35 year old female
- A NYC resident who was a teenager on 9/11
HOUSING FIRST MODEL to END HOMELESSNESS
Chapter 10 in your textbook talks about the importance of the Housing First model and how it is linked to reducing poverty and crime.
Watch the following YouTube video to see how Calgary is implementing the Housing First Model to end homelessness in your own backyard.
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