teaching
U.S. History
12/29/2009 17:30
Last semester I TAed a class in U.S. History, 1876 to the present. I thought it went fairly well, but there were some things I thought I'd change, if I had it all to do myself. So, rather than forget what those things were, I went ahead today and wrote up a syllabus of how I would teach the class. Might not be the ultimate -- if I ended up teaching it several times, it would probably develop some more each time. I just wanted to use what I remembered of the students reactions to the material (and my own) to see what it would look like...
One thing I wasn't happy with was the emphasis on generational conflict. We covered it in the Victorian era, and then again in the 20s, the 50s and the 60s. There were some things we passed by -- there's not a lot of time to cover nearly a century and a half, after all. Another thing was (and maybe I'll get in trouble with some older faculty members for this, but here goes), I think the focus on Viet Nam was overdone. And I don't think you can really sustain the argument that the 60s hippie movement was as historically important as Civil Rights or the Women's movement. So I dumped it in favor of the environment, which I think is going to turn out to be historically big.
Anyway, I now have something I can show people, if I go looking for adjunct or continuing ed. jobs while I'm studying. Should probably put together an undergrad Environmental history syllabus too...
One thing I wasn't happy with was the emphasis on generational conflict. We covered it in the Victorian era, and then again in the 20s, the 50s and the 60s. There were some things we passed by -- there's not a lot of time to cover nearly a century and a half, after all. Another thing was (and maybe I'll get in trouble with some older faculty members for this, but here goes), I think the focus on Viet Nam was overdone. And I don't think you can really sustain the argument that the 60s hippie movement was as historically important as Civil Rights or the Women's movement. So I dumped it in favor of the environment, which I think is going to turn out to be historically big.
Anyway, I now have something I can show people, if I go looking for adjunct or continuing ed. jobs while I'm studying. Should probably put together an undergrad Environmental history syllabus too...
