EARLY MODERN EUROPEAN HISTORY JOURNAL INSTRUCTIONS
The Journal
The Journal is the main assignment in HIS 215. It should consist of a series of short writings of varying lengths about the course material. The purpose of the journal is to provide you with the opportunity for frequent thoughtful and analytical commentary upon course-related material. The advantages of the journal, to my mind, are that it breaks work down into regular and manageable chunks, and that it should enable you to seize hold of the curriculum in a way which reflects your own interests and style.
In order to give you a basic structure and to clearly communicate my expectations, I will specify certain mandated entries. I will also suggest other recommended entries. You should return several times throughout the semester to the list of Recommended First and Second Half Journal Entries in the Journal Section of the course web-site. But while that list should provide the core structure for your Journal, you need not treat it as an everything-on-this-list-must-be-completed mandate, You are encouraged to be imaginative in your own investigation and analysis of Early Modern European History and devote extra time to those parts of the course that you find to be most interesting.
It is important that you write regularly in your Journal. The rhythms of the semester will be such that you will no doubt be able to devote more time to your Journal at some times than at others. But I recommend that you write at least one entry every week on a regular basis. You can always revise your entries before you submit the Journal.
The entries can vary in format, length, and quality. Some entries may consist of one long paragraph while others may be a few pages in length. Some entries may be based on just one or two brief sources while others may involve you integrating your thoughts on a much wider range of materials. Do not hesitate to take risks and to express your own opinions. Try, however, not to succumb to the temptation to write in an easy, stream-of-consciousness style. There is no inherent tension between analytical rigour and personal insight. Some entries may come quite easily to you while others may involve significant intermediate steps including note-taking, outlining, and revision. I do want you to use the Journal as a place to analyze the course content and to deepen your own understanding. This will involve being an active reader and writer, one who highlights themes and draws connections in a distinct way between topics. However, it's fine to have some entries that are much more summary in nature. While it is required that all work in the Journal be your own writing, it can be a useful exercise to paraphrase what you have just read or watched, both to test yourself as to whether you have absorbed the basic information presented and to use as a future reference.
The Journal is an assignment designed to develop your critical writing skills. It is also meant to encourage extra effort. There are two ways to excel with the Journal. One is through demonstrated focused analytical writing. But another way is through showing me that you are going above and beyond in regards to how much you are learning in the course. The point of the Journal is not to write as many entries as quickly as you can. Concise writing is often not just more thoughtful but more time-consuming than verbose writing. However, if your Journal naturally grows to have far more than the base-line number of entries and pages, that's wonderful, and that should have a positive impact on your grade.
The Journal will be graded in two installments. It will be due near the mid-point of the semester. This installment will count for 25% of the course grade. The Journal will then again be due at the end of the semester. This installment will count for 25% of the course grade. I would like you to print your Journals and hand in to me in hard copy form. The mid-point hand-in provides an opportunity for me to provide you with some feedback and to ensure that we share mutual understanding as to the nature of the assignment.
My Assumptions About Teaching, About European History, And About This Course
Some of my assumptions and beliefs that inform my approach to this course include the following:
-- I assume that you are interested in European history and eager to learn as much about it as possible in this course. I appreciate that this may not be the case, including for valid reasons, but I choose to set up this course in such a way that it can enable eager students to learn rather than to be a teacher who is an enforcer and who regularly tests to hold you accountable.
-- I assume it will be impossible for you to learn all that you might like to learn given the amount of relevant material and the time constraints involved.
-- I think that history should involve not merely the struggle to understand past events but also to find meaning from those events. Our particular course includes topics that may at times seem distant to your current concerns. I challenge you to find connections to the material that relate to issues and themes that you consider to be of personal interest and importance.
-- I believe that my job as an instructor is to strike an appropriate balance between providing a common core curriculum and setting up structures that also allow you to study material of personal interest.
-- I assume that students will enter this course with varied past experiences, degrees of knowledge, areas of interest, and current academic abilities, and try to set up a structure that can offer something of educational value to each participant in the course and offer a very high probability of at least basic academic success for any student willing to put forth strong effort.
-- I assume that all that you include in the Journal will be your own original work and that you appreciate that it is unfair to both your classmates and to your instructor to engage in any cutting-and-pasting or other forms of plagiarism. I want to focus my limited time on helping students to learn rather than to detecting possible cheating, but will take appropriate steps if plagiarism is detected.
-- I myself enter this course more as a life-long learner than as an authority on European History and am continually humbled by the challenges associated with drawing deep meaning from the past.
Optional Notes Appendix
I have only recently introduced the Note-Taking Appendix Journal Option. Many of you may have no need to consider it.
However, I have come to appreciate that some students find it challenging to write extensive and well-developed entries on a regular basis. Others of you may still be struggling to master English as a second language. And some, myself included, find it useful to write down some careful notes while watching or listening to a documentary.
For those of you who do decide to include the Notes Appendix as one component of your Journal, this will be a separate section in which you include verbatim notes for readings, listenings, and viewings you have completed outside of class (it's even o.k. to include careful notes from in-class learning as well). Try to put things in your own words, because this helps you to absorb and retain information more effectively, but this is one place in which some direct transcribing is appropriate.
The Notes Appendix is not intended as a substitute for the Journal. But it can become an important complement to it. It's particularly appropriate for those students who are planning to put strong effort into the class but are concerned that those efforts may not be reflected in their Journal entries.