A Note on How to Approach this Semester (and How I Am Doing So)

As we all know too well, the Fall 2020 semester will likely be anything but business as usual.  The ways in which we will be mixing in-person and on-line interactions as well as possible unanticipated rapid transitions between them may present challenges to us all. 

I am convinced that whatever may come we can and will have a meaningful semester in which we all learn a lot, but we will have to keep in mind doing so may require even greater flexibility, consideration for one another, and self-discipline on all of our parts than usual. We will all be facing learning curves as we go forward and in all likelihood we all will make judgments that afterwards we would not make again (I hesitate to call such judgments mistakes as that suggests that we know that in advance, as opposed to being things we try and then learn from).

For these reasons, please know that the ways in which I am proposing structuring classroom sessions and on-line discussion activities in this syllabus are admittedly experimental and may change.  Please share your thoughts on them and feel free to suggest approaches, ways of organizing discussions (in-person or on-line), or other activities that you believe may help you and your classmates to better engage with the course material.  I cannot neglect my responsibility to set the rules for the game that is our course in ways that I believe best assure both academic rigor and fairness across the class, but you can be assured that I will value and carefully consider any suggestions you may make. 

More generally, I am committed to the principle that my aims as an undergraduate history instructor should be to push (and to help) you to develop the skills, capacities, and modes of interpretation and understanding that will allow you to engage critically with the human past, the traces it has left, the ever-renewing knowledge we have of it, and its meanings for our present.  My role is that of a ‘coach,’ not a performer playing a show or a talking head telling you what’s what (although sometimes I will suggest my understandings of that too).  With this approach, you will without doubt learn more and develop abilities that are useful in other settings more fully than if I simply lectured and asked you to repeat that material on exams, and you will likely find what we do more interesting too. However, for this approach to work, you need to commit yourselves to the following:

1.  Do the course reading (and especially the discussion reading) on a timely basis.  You absolutely must complete it before the class in which we are discussing it and/or the deadline for making a related forum post (if you can finish it even earlier and thus have a bit more time to think about it, that’s even better).  Frequently this course will involve a significant amount of out-of-class reading.  I know that this may be a challenge for some of you, but we collectively need an ample amount of solid material to work with to make our discussions meaningful.  Also, do know that with practice you will develop your abilities to deal with larger amounts of reading in limited time frames.  We will talk more about how to do the reading and the kinds of things you should be looking for in doing it in class.

2.  Respect deadlines for discussion forum posts, and whenever possible post (and respond to classmates’ posts) sooner rather than later.  While these posts do count towards your participation grade, they are not ‘homework’ that you should do to show me that you are doing the work.  Rather, they are opportunities for you to develop, share, and debate your thoughts and questions about the reading and other course material with one another.  We have to meet deadlines to give that interaction space to happen.

3.  Maintain a respectful, professional tone in your posts and responses, but don’t be afraid to experiment with ideas and interpretations out of fear that they may be controversial (just work on clearly expressing your reasoning).  On this note, I think our discussions will function best if we all work on the assumption that each of us is openly and forthrightly attempting to grapple with the complexities and ambiguities of our shared human past and its relationship to our present (and that the things we say and write are never intended to harm or to insult).  Engaging with that past often forces us to look at the many horrid and ugly things that humans have done (and continue to do) to one another, which can be a difficult and painful experience.  Frank and open discussion is the best way both to seek to understand that past and to forge civil and tolerant ways of interacting and living with it and one another in the present.

4.  Give credit where credit is due, and be sure that all work you hand in is your own.  I do not believe that point needs extensive discussion.  Not only does plagiarism or any other form of cheating defeat the whole purpose of going to university to learn and to improve one’s abilities, it undermines the basic trust any community needs to learn and work together.

5.  Try not to be too nervous about grades.  We learn by practice, we all fall short of our aims sometimes, and we sometimes learn more from falling short than anything else.  I purposefully keep many assignments fairly open in terms of the types of topics and arguments you may develop to give you the freedom to present your ideas and sharpen your abilities, and such freedom always entails risks.  Know that I put mechanisms in place to weigh the improvement that you make over the course into the calculation of your final course grade.

6.  Keep lines of communication open—if you have questions or concerns, raise them.

In successfully completing this course, you should:

     Cultivate an understanding of the most important themes and developments of Western history from prehistory to the 16th century CE;
     Develop an awareness of some of the more important modes of analysis that historians use to reconstruct and interpret the past.

You should work on developing (and improving) the following skills:

     Critical analysis of primary sources;
     Critical analysis of scholarly arguments;
     Developing well-reasoned, well-supported arguments;
     Communicating your arguments effectively in writing and oral discussion.

Course Readings

The textbook reading (Noble et al) complements our discussions and lectures by providing you with further contextual information and different interpretations of past events. You should try do the textbook reading for the day it is assigned, and this is especially important if you have not studied these topics previously. The books should be available at the Almost Corner Bookshop (Via del Moro, 45).

All other readings provide the basis for our classroom and on-line discussions. You must read and think about those assigned for a particular class period and/or the deadline for making a related forum post.  Otherwise, you will be unable to participate adequately and your participation grade will suffer. You should also bring this material to class on the days that we are discussing it.

Please note that in using on-line primary sources I am not necessarily endorsing the more general content and intent of the websites on which they are found.

Important Course Policies

All assignments should be handed in through the Moodle portal for the assignment.

All late work will be penalized by at least one letter grade. No late work will be accepted following the final examination.

Any documented case of academic dishonesty on any assignment will result in a failing grade for the assignment in question and may also result in a failing grade for the course as a whole, regardless of the assignment's weight in terms of the final course grade. Please remember that, as the University's policy states, "Plagiarism can be deliberate or negligent; students are responsible for ensuring that any work submitted with their name on it is properly referenced."  If you have questions about how to cite material properly, refer to the appropriate sections of the MLA Style Manual or Chicago Manual of Style--if you have questions as to whether particular pieces of material should be cited, ask me. Note that submitting work that you have previously submitted (or plan to submit) for credit in another course is also a form of academic dishonesty, unless you obtain explicit approval from both instructors to do so. For this course, no such double submission is allowed. Please note that your papers and take-home exams are to be submitted to turnitin.com to check their content for plagiarism. I am setting up the turintin submission options so that you can see the similarity reports the service generates and resubmit your papers up until the due date.

Office Hours, Scheduling Appointments, E-mail Guidance, etc.

My office hours are posted on the course Moodle page along with a link for attending them--following JCU suggestions, they will be carried out remotely using MS Teams this semester.  If you need to schedule an appointment to speak with me, simply send me an e-mail identifying times during the upcoming week when you are available.  Please know that I do not normally respond to e-mails during the weekend or after 6:30-7 p.m. (but do feel free to write me at those times--I'll answer at the beginning of the next week or the next day).  In the context of mixed on-line and in-class education, it is even more important for all of us to set aside time to work on other things, disconnect, recharge, and 'stay human.'  I encourage you to do the same in ways that work with your schedule, and am trying to do what I can to provide as much flexibility as possible for you in structuring on-line and other out-of-class activities.

Types and Formats of On-line Moodle Discussion Forums

“Questions for the Professor” Forum:  Use this forum to ask for clarifications regarding material that we discussed in class or if there is something in the readings that you feel remains unclear, confusing, etc..  Also try to read through this regularly to see if a classmate asked a question that you too have, but just hadn’t thought of yet.  When you do so, if you feel that you can answer a classmate’s query, please feel free to go ahead and do so.  I will review this forum the Mondays and Wednesdays before class meetings—depending on the nature of the question I’ll either respond directly in the forum or we’ll talk about it at the beginning of the next class session.  (This forum closes at noon on Monday of the following week—if you realize you have a question after it’s closed simply post your question on the next week’s “Questions for the Professor Forum under the “Questions about something from earlier in the semester” topic.”)

“Your Discussion Questions and Observations” Forum:  For at least one of our two weekly sessions, you should post a question or observation about the discussion readings (e.g., for the second class of the second week, the excerpts from Exodus and/or Jeremiah) that you believe would provide a good way of starting a discussion about them and the subject they treat.You should post your questions/observations by 9 a.m. on the day of the class in which we will be discussing the readings in question (e.g., if they are on Tuesday’s reading, make your post by 9:00 on Tuesday) so that I have time to read them, think about them, and try to work them into our classroom discussions.  Try to read through them before class yourselves too—in that way you can better prepare yourself for whatever we end up talking about.  Feel free to build on your classmate’s questions/observations, and if there’s a post you want to respond to that we don’t end up talking about in class, please feel free to continue the discussion here. There is no specific required length for your posts (if you likely need 2-3 sentences to situate and raise your question/make your prompt). This weekly forum closes at 12 p.m. on Monday of the following week, but if there’s a strand of discussion you think we should continue into the next week because it remains relevant to the next topics we are discussing feel free to start it anew in the next week’s forum. (Maximum expected time per week, not including the time needed to do the reading: 10-20 minutes)

“Reflecting on the Week, Continuing our Classroom Discussion” Forums: For this weekly forum, I will post a few discussion questions or prompts based on the week’s discussion readings and the material I anticipate us discussing in class.  On occasion, as the week goes on, I’ll also add a few of the questions/prompts that you put up on the “Your Discussion Questions and Observations” Forum.  You should post at least one response to at least one of these threads and at least one response to a classmate's post each week.  Of course, feel free to post as much as you like. There is no specific required length for your posts (if you likely need a few sentences to make your point effectively).  This weekly forum closes at 12 p.m. on Monday of the following week. (Maximum expected time per week, not including the time needed to do the reading: 15-30 minutes)

In-Class Organizational Matters Whenever Some Students Are Either Absent or Attending Remotely

In light of the very particular nature of this semester, should any member of the class not be physically present in the classroom, we will have to record the class session.  In addition, whenever any member of the class is following the day's session remotely, I will need to ask one or more of those of you who are present to monitor the MS Teams stream and inform me should a remote student raise the hand icon or intervene by means of the Teams chat.

Accessing the Course Remotely

If you are obliged to follow the course remotely, you can find a link for accessing the course stream at the top of the course Moodle page.  Clicking on the link there should then bring you to the MS Teams meeting where we will stream class sessions.

Course Schedule (Please note that the following is subject to change--any updates will be made directly to the course Moodle page.  All discussion readings (except Bartlett's The Hanged Man) are accessible on the course Moodle page.)