History Goals + Competencies

WRITING AND SKILLS 

• Reading and film responses 
• Reading summaries
• Source document analysis
• Brief position papers
• Learning how to quote a source, primary or secondary
• Learning basic editing and formatting guidelines

CRITICAL THINKING

• Learning to select appropriate topics conducting basic research       
• Learning to recognize the difference between primary and secondary sources and beginning to think critically about both       
• Beginning to formulate a thesis or claim       
• Beginning to spot historical trends or parallels
• Beginning to recognize authors' claims and arguments

WRITING AND SKILLS

• Any of the above        
• Primary research reports 
• Documentary and secondary source analysis       
• Archival source reports 
• A major research essay    
• Learning to quote and cite sources, correctly and consistently

• graduating to quoting mainly primary source material, rather than secondary source authors

• Learning to format and edit historical writing correctly and consistently

• Learning to manage multiple deadlines

• Learning how to assess the work of another historian and a classmate in the form of book and article reviews, feedback on drafts

CRITICAL THINKING

• Learning to write comparative source analyses
• Learning to formulate a thesis or claim
• Learning to spot historical trends or parallels
• Earning to reconcile or synthesize varying or discrepant data, claims, or evidence
• Leaning to support claims with evidence
• Learning to identify poor or conflicting evidence
• Learning to identify bogus claims and faulty reasoning
• Introduction to/development of the ability to recognize and assess historical interpretation

WRITING AND SKILLS

• Any of the above

• Writing comparative papers across differing fields, eras, regions, etc.

• Coming to master written format: structure, quoting sources, editing, citations, notes, and bibliographies

• Writing often and meeting multiple deadlines

         

CRITICAL THINKING

• Coming to master the above
• Formulating more sophisticated responses to source documents or works of scholarship
• Expressing complex ideas orally and in writing
• Learning to build complex arguments supported by various sources

WRITING AND SKILLS

• Any of the above
• A major historiography paper

CRITICAL THINKING

• Recognizing and articulating the difference between history as "sum total" of past events vs. history as the created, written record of the past 
• Understanding that the discipline of history has a history of its own
• Recognizing and identifying various schools of historical thought and interpretation
• Understanding that written history and historical interpretations are conditioned by the cultural context in which they originate
• Understanding history as a profession and learning about opportunities for practice of that profession