HIST 2B - World History to 1500

Examples: Students can be required to complete essay exams aimed at assessing the student's ability to form important historical questions, develop a thesis, and argue the thesis utilizing both primary and secondary evidence. The student is asked to exhibit a thorough and sophisticated understanding of the inter-relationships among events and/or concepts, the essential institutions of the society under study, and exhibit a good comprehension of content material. Students can be required to write a research paper related to the course material in which they develop and support a thesis statement utilizing primary and secondary sources. Research papers should include proper citations in MLA, APA or Chicago format. Students can be expected to complete assignments that explore primary and secondary source evidence in order to create and support historical arguments. Document analyses will ask the student to evaluate primary source documents analytically and critically by answering the following questions: who was the author and when was the source written, who was the intended audience, what was the strategy of the author, what assumptions did the author make, what is the author's bias, what does the document reveal about the author and his/her society? Exams are evaluated on the student's ability to synthesize key concepts covered in the course readings, assignments and lectures. Students may be asked to briefly define and identify key concepts, terms and people. They are evaluated on the ability to demonstrate understanding of the importance of concepts, terms and people. Objective examinations will evaluate how well the student is able to formulate a chronology of major world civilizations and events in world history, as well as identify the contributions of various civilizations, cultures, and individuals including ethnic, gender and marginalized groups within the historical context. Objective exams may also evaluate the student's ability to identify key concepts and events covered in the course readings, assignments and lectures. Students can be expected to create an oral presentation based on a research topic, current news articles involving historical themes covered in class, or a museum exhibit relevant to the periods covered in the course in order to demonstrate how students can identify and explore historical concepts in the contemporary world. Students are evaluated on the ability to conduct research and present historical concepts, people, or artifacts and draw conclusions on how they relate to the modern era. Students can be required to do an analysis of a museum exhibit or historical site as it pertains to history. Students can be expected to create a paper based on a museum exhibit or a historical site relevant to the periods covered in the course in order to explore historical concepts as they are portrayed in the contemporary world. Students can be expected to look for a bias in the exhibit or site and consider aspects that could be changed to alter the interpretation. The paper would be evaluated according to the thoroughness of the analysis, whether it adequately considered the issue of bias, and how well the analysis demonstrates a familiarity with the context of the historical artifacts on display and/or the historical narrative portrayed at a site visit.