Modified backwards (#122745)
by Jonathan Dresner on May 15, 2008 at 5:16 PM

My wife, in HS, had a US history survey which started with WWI, then doubled back to Columbus after reaching the present (on the grounds that the 19c is pretty well-traveled ground, though she claims she never got much between the Civil War and WWI. Neither did I, and my classes were linear).

My late aunt used to start a US survey with a unit on the last 10-20 years, during which the students would collectively make a list of some of the biggest issues. Then they would go back to the beginning and use those issues as the themes which dominated the year.

I've often thought about that model, especially for my modern Asia courses: start with a contemporary movie and/or personal narrative (I love using first-person stuff), spend some time discussing it, then go back to the beginning. That way the course starts in a relatively familiar place.

I don't know that it would work all that well for my pre-modern courses: the ending place is already sufficiently unfamiliar to students that constructing it from the ground up makes more sense.

For World History, it's already so damned whiggish that I don't see the point.