George Vascik Short Writing Assignment for Students 2003 Workshop on Improving Student Writing Center for Writing Excellence Center for the Enhancement of Learning and Teaching
George Vascik Course: HST332, Age of Dictators. Europe 1914-1945
Course goals: This course examines the causes of national conflict and war in early 20th century Europe, with an emphasis on the emergence of anti-liberal, statist models of social, economic and political organization. My major thematic concerns are the dynamics of continuity and change over time and the inter-relatedness of domestic and foreign policy. I have three goals in the course. First, I want each student to acquire a high level of content knowledge about the period. Second, I want each student to be able to think critically and analyze that content. Third, I want to train each student in historical thinking and methods so that they can bring the knowledge that they acquire in this class to bear upon significant questions within the discipline. Assignment context: The goal of this assignment is to encourage students to read the weekly readings before class. If successful, they will have in hand an array of contextual knowledge with which to understand the recitations and participate more fully in class discussion. I also hope in this way to move them to begin to analyze data in a thoughtful and systematic manner. Grading criteria: The class meets once weekly (on Thursday evening). At the beginning of seven class meetings, students will be asked to write for 10 minutes. Papers will be assessed points from 0 to 2. A score of 2 indicates that the student has an adequate fund of content knowledge drawn from the readings and has attempted to analyze that knowledge. A score of 1 will indicate that the student either has a sufficient fund of content knowledge but lacks content analysis, or that the student needs to demonstrate more content and more analysis. A score of 0 indicates that the student has not demonstrated that s/he has read the material or is capable of analysis. I will count the five best results, effectively allowing each student to take a pass on two of the evenings. A sample weekly writing exercise, in this case the 2nd week of class: The goal of this exercise is to promote timely and thoughtful reading of the course material. Your grade will be based upon your ability 1) to recount the facts represented in the text reading assigned for tonight and 2) to assess/analyze the historical data presented in the text. Using the front and back of this handout, please use the next 10 minutes to address one of the following questions: What factors prompted the actions of each of the major powers in the July Crisis subsequent to the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand in Sarajevo? Which factors do you think that they decisive? Defend or refute Fritz Fischer’s thesis that German policy played the leading role in transforming the July Crisis into a world war. |