Finals have been graded and over the course of the week, I am leaving individual comments and thoughts with each student. Below are some general ideas that came out of my review of your work. Thanks for a great year and have a safe and fun summer!
1. The chats were generally not as strong as the chats we had in the classes leading up to the exam. I think part of this was nerves and part was the fact that this was an "exam", but it had a few non-traditional exam elements. We actually had more time for the chat during the exam than during class yet on the whole produced fewer good sources and what seemed like less truly engaged conversation. In the future, I need to think about how to get students to be as comfortable on this section as they were in class.
2. Agricultural Revolution. In general, responses to these questions were strong and everybody finished in the allotted time. In the first part, I was looking for an explanation of how agriculture led to cities; that seemed well understood. Most people had no problem identifying where the revolution happened, though I was looking for an explanation of what it was about that geography that allowed it to happen and some folks didn't give that explanation. On the question of a modern decline in agriculture, many folks hit upon the idea that famine, war, and general chaos could cause a breakdown in the very structures -- professions, cities, etc -- that the agricultural revolution allowed for in the first place.
3. In general, folks did very well on the comparison of Egyptian and Greek concepts of death. If you took notes during our discussions about the Ka and the Book of the Dead, you had a definite advantage.
4. Herodotus vs. Thucydides proved a little tricky, but most people got it. Basically, as we discussed during prep, Herodotus gathered all of the stories he could and therefore presented a varied and interesting, but occasionally not-entirely-based-in-fact history; Thucydides on the other hand is considered the father of scientific history and worked hard to only include sources he could vet. So, newspaper articles that centered on showing people's opinions and the stories they had to tell would fit into the former, while more analytic reporting would fit into the latter.
5. Rome. This one caused problems for a lot of people, and for that reason I only weighed it as half-value. Folks who did get more credit were those who looked for the big picture -- for example, finding a case of political corruption and comparing it to the stories of political corruption in Suetonius; or finding a story discussing American politics and comparing the structure of our political system to the political system in Rome. I don't think the time limit was a problem here, as all of you had completed 30 minute essays in class; I felt by giving you an extra 10 minutes you would have time to prepare. Next time, I am likely going to drop the essay format altogether and ask that people write straightforward formal outlines: thesis, three pieces of evidence, explanation/analysis, conclusion.
6. Third Crusade. Overall, people did express their understanding that an argument can be made that Richard may have been more the warmonger and Saladin more the reasonable one. That's a crucial understanding to what is a difficult history. Some folks were much more creative in how they did this. In general, I was not crazy about the Richard campaign wikis; perhaps you might have even worked better on these individually. I found most to be simply a picture and a generic slogan -- high quality meant using the primary sources available as the source of your slogans; perhaps that was too much to be expected in a partnership and under time constraints. On the Saladin op-ed, credit was given to those folks who reasoned according to the historical record and demonstrated that they understood the history; some folks did very well on the Saladin part.
7. The Black Death. In general, folks did very well here. I was looking for a clear explanation of where it came from, what it was, who is presented itself on the body, and how it affected people. This question was about looking at history through a micro rather than a macro lens.
8. Romanesque vs. Gothic. In general, I was very impressed. I was looking for clear examples of Romanesque and Gothic cathedrals and a clear understanding that you knew how each type of cathedral represented the theology of its time. Good stuff.
9. Renaissance Man. While some people wrote excellent pieces explaining what a Ren Man was and demonstrating through quotes and pictures why their vote was picked, in general people lost credit on this question. I know it was late in the exam and we'd been working hard for a long time, but most answers read as generic and unsupported claims. Remember: sources -- both primary texts and artworks -- matter. If you remember nothing else from this class, remember that in any argument you need to back up what you say with clear evidence.
10. Thank you for your consideration. I have learned a lot about teaching from being with you all this year and I look forward to seeing how things go for you at JC. Remember that you can always email or tweet me for advice in other classes; I will be leading the virtual Latin class on next years program and will be at JC for student meetings regularly.
Be sure to look over your exam and compare it to these notes. Most grades fit in the 80 to 95 range, which is good. The basic breakdown was 97 = A+, 95 = A, 90 = A-, 88 = B+, 85 = B, 80 = B-, 75 = C, 70 = Pass. As I said, I am spending this week leaving individual comments, so you should see those soon.
Best,
Wojo
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