Whether you already work with children and young people or would like to work with them, our BA Psychological Studies (Child Development and Education) will prepare you for a wide range of jobs and help enhance your career progression. It offers you the opportunity to gain skills and understanding in how psychological theory and research can be applied to supporting children’s and young people’s learning and development more effectively.

- This course is ideal if you want to work with children and young people. You will learn about their development, mental health, emotional wellbeing, and how psychology can be applied to support wellbeing and learning.- It will allow you to explore how psychological theories and research can be applied to professional contexts.- It will also help you develop professional skills, as well as strategies and approaches that will be directly applicable in your work.

Drawing on our expertise in psychological sciences, this course focuses on a range of relevant issues, including: - intellectual, social and emotional development - children’s mental health and wellbeing - learning and learning difficulties - communication and relationship building - special educational needs, inclusion and diversity - reflective practice. You will study key issues in developmental and educational psychology, critically analyse theories and research, and explore how these can support your professional practice. Throughout the degree you will be able to select option modules to reflect your interests. In your final year you will produce an extended essay on a topic of your choice.

This course is available to study part-time

. Our approach is highly student-centred with a focus on building your skills including through additional study days and workshops. You will also have the opportunity to reflect on your own career and professional practice, as well as obtaining valuable experience through a short placement.

- Birkbeck is strongly oriented towards research in psychological sciences and we are home to the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, , the Birkbeck-UCL Centre for Neuroimaging and the Centre for Cognition, Computation and Modelling. We also recently became members of the Bloomsbury Centre for Genetic Epidemiology and Statistics. - In the 2023 National Student Survey, Birkbeck's School of Psychological Sciences ranked 5th in the UK for teaching. We are consistently regarded as one of the top institutions teaching psychological sciences in the UK. In the 2021 Research Excellence Framework, and for the third time, we were ranked in the top ten universities in the UK.