Category Archives: homework

Some thoughts on Document Assignments

In no particular order:

  • Be careful about using the language of historical documents.
    • Careful paraphrasing makes it clear that you understand the material in a way that shallow paraphrasing does not.
    • Be careful not to copy the bad habits, slurs and errors of your sources: e.g. “papist”
  • The textbook is an excellent source of historical context, both prior background and responses. You shouldn’t be guessing until you’ve at least examined what the book has to say.
    • However, you also need to show me that you’ve read the document, not just the textbook, by engaging it in some detail.
  • Two points on writing and structure:
    • As I said before, the questions in the assignment sheet are guidance, and if they’re not relevant or you don’t understand them, don’t try to answer them.
    • Take a minute or two after writing to think about whether you’ve got the material in the right sections. Don’t shift things around to make the sections look balanced: put the relevant material where I am supposed to find it.

Finally, I’m only getting document assignments from about half of you. Why? It’s not really that hard of an assignment: read something, summarize it, read the textbook to see where it fits in the history, and think about it a little. I’m not saying that doing it well is easy, but at least do it: these documents will show up on tests, and will also be required for the final exam take-home essays. If you’ve been reading them all along, you’ll have a much better sense of what it all means at the end.

Document Analysis comments

In no particular order

  • “Bias” means something that distorts the meaning of the text. A preference or opinion may be evidence of bias, but you’d have to show how that actually introduced some error into the record. Conversely, just because you know who someone is doesn’t make them trustworthy or free of bias.
  • The questions in the assignment prompt are not a checklist: not all of them will be equally helpful and quoting them certainly isn’t going to advance your analysis
  • The emphasis should be on analysis: the content and historical use categories are really the most critical, though the Context and authorship categories are also very much worthwhile.
  • Looking up stuff to fill in gaps in your understanding is fine, but you have to remember to evaluate the quality of the source you find (a test wikipedia often fails), and the question of whether what you’ve found actually belongs in your paper. I don’t care, for example where or how de Busbecq died, as long as it wasn’t related to these writings.
  • If you use a source, you should cite it. If you use the textbook, tell me what page or pages. If you use an outside source like the Encyclopedia Brittanica, you need to list the source and article or page. Using information from a source without citing it is a form of plagiarism and will not be tolerated if detected.

Regarding the tests:

  • When I said pick one, I meant one. There are no questions on this test where Picking more than one option was the correct choice. And even if one of your choices was correct, I can’t really give you credit for it without everyone wanting to try it.
  • I did, however, give partial credit if you missed an “all of the above” answer, and for partially correct responses to the “Why” question on the Renaissance.

I will have the grade distributions for the Document and Test later today.

Reminder: Test Review Assignment Due Midnight, Tuesday

As the syllabus says, your review assignment, which must be emailed to me no later than Tuesday midnight, is at least five multiple choice questions – based on the study guide terms – for each chapter covered in that section of the course. There are three chapters in this section – 15, 16 and 17 – so you need to do at least (I’m always happy to have more, if you want to do more) fifteen questions.

The questions should be multiple choice, though if you want to throw in a true/false or fill-in-the-blank now and then, that’s OK, but only a couple. You should clearly mark which chapter the question comes from, and indicate which answer you intend to be the correct one. If it’s not obvious which study term the question is based on, make sure you tell me that, too. The answers can and should be based on both the textbook, readings (de Busbeq is fair game), and lectures including powerpoints and resources.

The questions shouldn’t be about trivia: I don’t care about the precise date of Columbus’ voyage, or Zheng He’s religion as much as I care about what they did and why it matters. Don’t copy the language of the textbook or a powerpoint and expect students to remember the exact words used: the significance of events and people is about the connections and changes they were part of. For a brief tutorial on using multiple choice questions to test more advanced learning, read this overview of Bloom’s taxonomy of learning by a professor at the Other PSU

Multiple choice questions are tricky. The traditional question has:  one clearly right answer, one clearly wrong answer (if you know the material), and two answers that are appear possibly right but which are actually clearly wrong.  My problem writing questions is that I tend to assume that people know too much, so my ‘wrong’ answers are sometimes too close to actually correct. You may also use “all of the above” – including an item which looks wrong but is actually true makes it a challenging question – or “none of the above” as options, if you’re inspired.

I will make a selection of your questions available for review and may use, or modify, your questions on the test itself.

The 50-minute test will consist of 50 multiple choice (or other) questions. “Other” may include a short definition or two, as well as true/false, fill-in-the-blank questions. There may be extra credit opportunities: they will be clearly marked.

Spring 2011: Welcome!

A quick guide for those new to my edublogs sites:

  • I will use this blog, the front page of the site, for announcements and some assignments. You can check the blog regularly (I recommend at least once before each class) or subscribe to the blog’s RSS feed if you read news and blogs that way, or get emails of new posts (you have to sign up for an edublogs account, but I believe it’s free).
  • The links in the header above will take you to most of the important starting places.
    • The Resources For World History page is an archive of handouts (I don’t actually hand them out anymore, but you can print them out yourself if you like), powerpoints, links to readings, policy statements, and other resources which I’ve used in the classroom. Usually, if I use something (or even think about using something), I’ll link it from the course schedule page (see below), but if I don’t, or if you just want to look around, this is the place to go.
    • The main course pages – Hist 102 (Spring 2011) for World History Since 1500 (both sections) and World History Seminar (820) for the graduate seminar World History as Discipline – contain a schedule of readings and assignments and resources complete with links to the appropriate posts and pages. This is the page that will change if there are schedule changes, the most up-to-date version of what’s coming up. From there, you can get to the original course syllabus, and some critical policy documents, or you can go to the Syllabi page.

I use Angel primarily as an email tool, and if it becomes necessary to provide a video lecture through Tegrity due to weather or other delays,  it will be made available through Angel. You can see my upper division course sites on edublogs as well: Japan, China and Korea.

Book Review Results

The median score was a C+ meaning that about as many people got above a C+ or above as a C+ or below; the average score was a C. Here’s how the grade scale worked out:

Grade Level distribution
A 5%
B 20%
C 55%
D 10%
F 10%

Update: After a quick look at the final I can say that the most popular question was #5 (WWI/Long 19th Century), followed closely by #2 (French Revolution Effects) and #3 (Industrial Revolution in Asia/Africa). The other questions were pretty evenly distributed, except for the very unpopular #1 (China’s Role).

List of Books for Presentation, Section 4 (2pm)

Eating History Chapter

Student

Book
1.Oliver Evans’s Automated Mill (mechanical flour milling) Curry
2.The Erie Canal (transportation) DeWeese Emerson david fite, social and industrial conditions in the north during the civil war
3.Delmonico’s (French cuisine) Carr Jacques Pepin, The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen
4.Sylvester Graham’s Reforms (health food) Kempton Sex, Diet, and Debility in Jacksonian America
5.Cyrus McCormick’s Reaper (agricultural mechanization)
6.A Multiethnic Smorgasbord (immigration) Butler We Are What We Eat by Donna R. Gabaccia
7.Giving Thanks (Thanksgiving Holiday) Lewis Northwood by Sarah Josepha Hale
8.Gail Borden’s Canned Milk (canning) Blessent Hooker, Food and Drink in America
9.The Homogenizing War (Civil War) Pulliam

Prince

 “The Civil War: A Catalyst of Agricultural Revolution” by Wayne D. Rasmussen

Stephen Ambrose, Nothing Like it in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad
10.The Transcontinental Railroad (refrigeration) Stillings Stephen Ambrose, Nothing Like it in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad
11.Fair Food (1876 & 1893 World Fairs) Carlson Andrew Smith, Hamburger: A Global History.
12.Henry Crowell’s Quaker Special (packaging and marketing) Gardner
13.Wilbur O. Atwater’s Calorimeter (nutrition science) Herder Food Politics by Marion Nestle.
14.The Cracker Jack Snack (snacks and candy) Elliot Joel Glenn Brenner, The Emperors of chocolate: Inside the Secret World of Hershey and Mars.
15.Fannie Farmer’s Cookbook (standardization) LeTourneau History of Home Economics by Hazel Thompson Craig
16.The Kellogg’s Corn Flakes (breakfast cereals)
17.Upton Sinclair’s Jungle (food safety) Gregory
18.Frozen Seafood and TV Dinners Bibbs Harvey Levenstein, Paradox of Plenty: A Social History of Eating in Modern America
19.Michael Cullen’s Super Market Engledow Paradox of Plenty: A Social History of Eating in Modern America by Harvey Levenstein
20.Earle MacAusland’s Gourmet (food magazines) Bass
21.Jerome I. Rodale’s Organic Gardening DeBoutez Frances Moore Lappe and Anna Lappe, Hope’s Edge: The Next Diet for Small Planet
22.Percy Spencer’s Radar (microwave ovens) Fyock
23.Frances Roth and Katherine Angell’s CIA (Culinary Institute of America) Wade Amy Trubeck, Haute Cuisine
24.McDonald’s Drive-In (fast food) Babcock Aleksander Borisovich Lakier, A Russian Looks At America
25.Julia Child, the French Chef (television and cuisine) Pierce
26.Jean Nidetch’s Diet (Weight Watchers) Smithson Losing it: America’s Obsession with Weight and the Industry That Feeds on It
27.Alice Water’s Chez Panisse (local food)
28.TVFN (cable food network) Stolifer ‘Emeril! : inside the amazing success of today’s most popular chef‘.
29.The Flavr Savr (genetically modified foods) Bullard
30.Mergers, Acquisitions, and Spin-Offs (food industry) Starr American empress : the life and times of Marjorie Merriweather Post by Nancy Rubin

List of Books for Presentation, Section 2 (10am)

Eating History Chapter

Student

Book
1.Oliver Evans’s Automated Mill (mechanical flour milling)
2.The Erie Canal (transportation) Kutz
3.Delmonico’s (French cuisine) Brush
4.Sylvester Graham’s Reforms (health food) Harding Fast Food Nation, by Eric Schlosser
5.Cyrus McCormick’s Reaper (agricultural mechanization) Gomez Mechanization Takes Command: a contribution to anonymous history. by Sigfried Giedion
6.A Multiethnic Smorgasbord (immigration) Jegen We Are What We Eat by Donna R. Gabaccia
7.Giving Thanks (Thanksgiving Holiday) Carter Thanksgiving: An American Holiday; An American History
8.Gail Borden’s Canned Milk (canning) Eichelberger Food and Drink in America: A History by Richard J. Hooker
9.The Homogenizing War (Civil War) Griffin The Personal Memoirs of US Grant
10.The Transcontinental Railroad (refrigeration) Sammur Nothing Like it in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad by Stephen E. Ambrose
11.Fair Food (1876 & 1893 World Fairs) Tarvin Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser
12.Henry Crowell’s Quaker Special (packaging and marketing) Nicholson Total Package
13.Wilbur O. Atwater’s Calorimeter (nutrition science) Hendrix Revolution at the Table: The Transformation of the American Diet by Harvery A Levenstein
14.The Cracker Jack Snack (snacks and candy) Patterson From Columbus to ConAgra
15.Fannie Farmer’s Cookbook (standardization) New Laura Sharpiro, perfection salad
16.The Kellogg’s Corn Flakes (breakfast cereals) Dhooghe American empress : the life and times of Marjorie Merriweather Post by Rubin, Nancy.
17.Upton Sinclair’s Jungle (food safety) Thornton The Good Provider: HJ Heinz and his 57 Varieties
18.Frozen Seafood and TV Dinners Green Williams, Frozen Food
19.Michael Cullen’s Super Market
20.Earle MacAusland’s Gourmet (food magazines) Sugita Clementine in the Kitchen
21.Jerome I. Rodale’s Organic Gardening
22.Percy Spencer’s Radar (microwave ovens) Lednicky Never Done: Housework by Susan Strasser
23.Frances Roth and Katherine Angell’s CIA (Culinary Institute of America)
24.McDonald’s Drive-In (fast food) Streeter McDonald’s: Behind the Arches, rev. ed. By: John F. Love
25.Julia Child, the French Chef (television and cuisine) Rousseau

Walker

 appetite for life, the biography of Julia Child
26.Jean Nidetch’s Diet (Weight Watchers)
27.Alice Water’s Chez Panisse (local food) Tridle Shapiro, Laura. Julia Child: A Life
28.TVFN (cable food network) Mance Appetite for Life: The Biography of Julia Child by Noel Riley Fitch
29.The Flavr Savr (genetically modified foods)
30.Mergers, Acquisitions, and Spin-Offs (food industry) W. Smith Burrough and Helyar, Barbarians at the gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco

Final Exam Essays (Hist 102, Fall 2010) Due Friday, 12/17, 10am

Final Exam Essays Due Friday, 12/17

To my office (RH 406F) no later than 10am

The test will consist of two essays, equal in value, which you will choose from the following list:

  1. Describe China’s role in global economic history over the last five hundred years. This is not a history of China, but a discussion of how China has interacted with and influenced other countries and regions. There will be periods of greater and lesser influence, of course, and some domestic Chinese history will be necessary for clarity.
  2. What were the long-term effects of the French Revolution? Don’t do a history of the event, but look at the ways in which it affects French, European and World history over the following two centuries.
  3. How did the Industrial Revolution affect Asia and Africa differently? Why?
  4. Locke and Hobbes had very different ideas about the role of government and the rights of the individual. How have those ideas influenced political history over the last 300 years, and which of these thinkers is closest to our present-day ideas about rights and government? (globally, not just the United States) This will require describing their ideas, but your focus should be on the way their ideas are used over time.
  5. Why is World War One considered the end of the “long 19th century”? What changes happen during and because of the war, and are they sufficiently important to justify making WWI a dividing line between historical epochs?
  6. Write a history of agriculture from 1500 to present focusing on its economic role. This is not a general history of farming, but a specific analysis of the role of agriculture in the world economy. Issues to consider include: the percentage of farmers in the population; the flow of migration from rural regions; the Columbian Exchange; differences between regions of the world; changes in technology, fertilizers and crops; general lifestyle changes.
  7. Describe the world economy around 1700. Include trade, flows of silver and gold, the role of agriculture, major exporters and the state of technology. How are things changing?

Both Essays are due Friday, 12/17, 10am

There will be no extensions or late papers accepted

except in cases of documented medical emergency.

Instructions

  • This test covers the entire semester: textbooks, documents, and lectures.
    • This is a take-home assignment, so I am expecting two real essays, with introductions, thesis statements, paragraphs, conclusions, etc.
    • Don’t assume that “an answer” will be easily found in one section of one book. These essays require broad knowledge and analytical thinking.
    • Be concrete: evidence is always more convincing than generalization or simple logic.
  • You may think of it as two essays each worth 10% of your course grade; that’s certainly how I calculate it.
    • The grade is based primarily on the strength of your argument as an answer to the question: thesis, evidence (completeness and handling), logic.
    • Polished prose is not required, but basic courtesies like correct spelling and writing in grammatical standard English will be expected.
    • Clarity is crucial; structure is essential to a clear and effective argument.
  • Citations and Plagiarism
    • failure to acknowledge the source of your ideas or information is unacceptable. Plagiarism will result in no credit for the exam. Poor paraphrasing and poor citation will be penalized.
    • A Works Cited or Bibliography page is not required unless you use sources outside of the course readings and lectures. You must cite the source of information and ideas that are outside of “general knowledge,” including information from your course texts. Format of the notes is up to you: I prefer footnotes for my research, but parenthetical citations are fine as well; any format will be fine as long as it is used consistently and it clearly identifies the source and page of your information.
    • These questions can be answered more than adequately with reference to assigned readings and lectures. You are welcome to do more research and include outside sources if necessary, but you must be sure that they are relevant and of sufficient quality to enhance your argument.
    • Using outside sources instead of course materials will result in penalties.
  • Technical Details
    • Make sure that your name, section, e-mail address and the question are clearly indicated at the beginning of each essay, and that each essay begins on a fresh page. Title pages are not required.
    • There is neither a minimum nor a maximum length for these essays, but any answer less than 1000 words or more than 2500 is probably missing the point.
    • Double-spacing and title pages are not required, but readable type and font are.
    • Both Essays are due in my office (or mailbox, if you’re handing it in early) no later than 10am Friday. There will be no extensions or late papers accepted except in cases of documented medical emergency. Emailed files will only be accepted as proof of completion; printed essays must be delivered no later than 2pm Friday, and must be identical to the emailed files.

Writing a Book Review: Links

A few resources you might find useful as you work on your book reviews