6.3 Social work and the law in Scotland In this course you will be asked to reflect on the meanings of both social work and law. You will find that these concepts are open to a range of possible definitions, and that the functions of social work and law can change depending on the practice context. Their meaning is also affected by the perspective from which they are viewed, for example, the service user's experience of social work and law will not always match the expectations of the professional or the perceptions of the general
6.2 Introduction to the law in contemporary Scotland This course will introduce you to law making in Scotland. It is taken from W150 An introduction to law in contemporary Scotland, a new 15-point course from The Open University's Centre for Law. The course begins by developing your general and legal study skills such as reading unfamiliar information, note taking and critical thinking. It then asks you to think about what law is and introduces you to the legal history of Scotland. The course then moves to look at the Scottish Parliament
5.8 Finding information in art and history This course will help you to identify and use information in Arts and History, whether for your work, study or personal purposes. Experiment with some of the key resources in this subject area, and learn about the skills which will enable you to plan searches for information, so you can find what you are looking for more easily. Discover the meaning of information quality, and learn how to evaluate the information you come across. You will also be introduced to the many different ways of orga
4.5 David Hume This course examines David Hume's reasons for being complacent in the face of death, as these are laid out in his suppressed essay of 1755, ‘Of the immortality of the soul’. More generally, they examine some of the shifts in attitude concerning death and religious belief which were taking place in Europe at the end of the eighteenth century, through examination of this and other short essays. Hume was a pivotal figure in the Scottish Enlightenment and his death in 1776 was widely an
3.5 The incredible shrinking chip This course focuses on the creation of a semiconductor transistor – a versatile tiny transistor that is now at the heart of the electronics industry. In video clips the history of the incredible shrinking chip, its Scottish connections and an explanation of the physics that make chips work are accompanied by a reconstruction of the making of a transistor using the crude techniques of yesteryear. In this course we follow two Scottish computer engineers with little or no physics knowled
2.1 Overview The Scottish education system is distinctive and has a long independent history. The courses within this section cover the national curriculum framework in Scotland and give examples of learning in some Scottish schools. In teachers' professional development, The Open University works with The General Teaching Council for Scotland (the independent regulatory body for the teaching profession in Scotland) to develop courses and qualifications specifically tailored to Scotland's needs, e.g
1.1.2 Professional development in Scotland Scotland's legal and education systems are distinctive and differ from those of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. This therefore leads to differences in frameworks and standards of professional recognition within the United Kingdom. This section of OpenLearn Scotland introduces learners to areas of professional development where The Open University has developed curricula specifically to meet the needs of students and employers in Scotland.
1.1.1 Culture and society in Scotland Scotland has a rich and distinctive cultural heritage based on many aspects including language, history, music and literature. For a small country whose population has never been much in excess of five million, Scotland can be justifiably proud of its past achievements. However there have been significant changes in Scotland over the last decade, principally arising from devolution in 1999. This section of OpenLearn Scotland introduces learners to a wide range of topics reflecting both Scotla
1.1 Overview This course provides a gateway to over 30 other courses that have been specifically developed to have a particular relevance to Scotland.
Acknowledgements The content acknowledged below is Proprietary (see terms and conditions) and is used under licence. Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following source for permission to reproduce material: Woodward, K (2004) Questioning Identity: gender, class, ethnicity, Londo
5 Conclusion Are we now better equipped to answer the three questions posed in Section 1.1? How are identities formed? We present ourselves to others through everyday interactions, through the way we speak and dress, marking ourselves as the same as those with whom we share an identity and different from those with whom we do
3.4 Audio activity Using audio is a very idiosyncratic practice amongst Open University students. Some listen to them in the car, others on a personal stereo on the train, some while washing up, others at their desk. Flexibility of use is certainly one of their virtues. However you use them, some of the following may be useful guidelines. Read the notes for the activity before you listen. At the very least try and fix in your head or note down the main purpose of the aud
3.3 How others see us The relative nature of poverty is an old theme in social science. Adam Smith, the eighteenth century writer who is often regarded as the founding father of economics, put it this way: ‘By necessaries I understand not only the commodities that are indispensably necessary for the support of life, but whatever the custom of the country renders it indecent for creditable people, even the lowest orders, to be without’ (Smith, 1776, quoted in Sen, 1981). Ideas of what it is to be poor are
3.2 Necessities and luxuries As the division of opinion between the government and low income people illustrates, definitions of poverty are the stuff of political debate. People in the Rowntree studies tended to focus on ‘paying bills and food’. Most people's list of basic needs would also include adequate food and clean water, clothing, shelter and heating. But are there also less apparently physiological, more evidently social, necessities of life? 3.1 ‘Making ends meet’ When you say that someone is ‘poor’, what do you mean? Do people whom others call ‘poor’ always see themselves in that way? One group whose identities are greatly constrained by income are the poor. But, as the questions above suggest, poverty is not a simple fact of some lives: rather, it is a concept with different meanings, and a label that we may accept or reject. This section c 2.2 Gender categories Young children's gender categories are highly stereotyped. This can lead to assured predictions of an individual's preferences based upon knowledge of their gender, and the kinds of activities that they may typically engage in. Children develop such rigid gender categories in their search for certainty about gender. These categories are essentialist, having a simple in-group and out-group distinction that children use for understanding masculinity and femininity, and for defining their own ge 2.1 The development of gender identity In this section we are going to look at where we come from in terms of childhood experience and the development of gender identities in childhood. Gender identity involves the construction and use of gender categories. Children's gender categories are at first rather simplistic; but, as we shall see, children refine their categories so that they become more reliable and useful for their social lives. Studying the development of gender identity in children reveals that this is a story of a sea
