General College Curriculum Goals

Course Number: GC 1221: Minnesota History

Credits: 4

Diversified Core: None

Designated Theme: Historical Perspective

Writing Intensive: Yes

Completed by: Thomas Buckley

Date completed: 5 February 1999

A. Develop academic skills (i.e., processes involved with both acquiring and demonstrating knowledge) and successfully apply them to college-level coursework

Curricular Goals	Course Goals	Learning Activities
1. Students will read college-level texts.	Improve college level reading ability	Information from reading assignments is asked for in quizzes and exams.
2. Students will understand lecture material.	Improve listening and note-taking skills	There are quizzes on lecture material where students can use lecture notes. Those with better notes get higher scores.
3. Students will participate in classroom discussions.	Improve ability to articulate knowledge	Discussion is primarily related to individual term paper topics and the value of different sources of information. Students are invited to raise questions about lectures but they are expected to deal with content ranging from 1000 to 1990, with which few students are familiar prior to lecture, and few read ahead.
4. Students will write a variety of documents.	Intensive writing	Term project is built from a term paper proposal, ethnic study reading, a critical bibliography, a newspaper report, oral interview questions, and a final paper.
5. Students will understand quantitative problems.	Not applicable.
6. Students will be able to use a computer.	Yes and no. Computer use is urged for ease of writing and modifying the text of papers but is not required.	90% to 100% of papers are written on a computer
7. Students are willing to receive information and respond to it.	Improve ability to articulate knowledge.	Ten percent of the grade is based on attendance and participation but we do not eject the lazy nor embarrass the shy. Many students find discussion classes a great waste of their time. Many come here lacking in the most basic knowledge of history necessary to be a responsible citizen or succeed in college.
8. Students develop values, organize them into systems, and apply those systems to their private and public lives.	We seek to instill a sense of historical perspective, and the realization that a sense of history involves more than memorizing dates. This is not a course of indoctrination, individual adjustment, or political and social activism.	The course looks at changing social and political values from those of the Native American Cultures in from the first period of European-Native American contact to the present day. In their term papers students are to relate experiences from early settlers to present families/neighborhoods to the changing priorities and values of today.
9. Other.

B. Build and use a foundation of general knowledge in the discipline

Curricular Goals	Course Goals	Learning Activities
10. Appreciate the discipline as a valuable area of knowledge.	Students engage in historical research and writing.	Students become historians researching and writing the history of either their family or their town/neighborhood in relation to Minnesota and U.S. history.
11. Identify and describe issues or problems in the discipline.	Students engage in historical research and writing.	Students discuss in class and in individual meetings conflicts in fact and interpretation arising from their research.
12. Analyze and reflect upon issues or problems in the discipline.	Students engage in historical research and writing.	In oral reports and individual meetings students sometimes raise issues involving conflicts in fact and interpretation arising from their research.
13. Solve issues or problems in the discipline.	No	We do not have time.
14. Think creatively.	Students engage in historical research and writing.	Students sometimes seek out non-traditional sources of historical information and apply that information to their term project.
15. Other.

C. Demonstrate greater awareness of and respect for individual, cultural, ethnic, and religious differences

Curricular Goals	Course Goals	Learning Activities
16. Awareness and respect for diversity in terms of content.	Understand the contributions of the state's many ethnic groups.	In the second short paper students examine the problems and contributions of one of the ethnic groups of Minnesota and how it relates to their term project
17. Awareness and respect for diversity in terms of process.	Understand the contributions of the state's many ethnic groups.	This is implicit in the interviews they conduct to gather primary source material for their papers
18. Other.

D. Develop attitudes and behaviors that are associated with success in college

Curricular Goals	Course Goals	Learning Activities
19. Class participation.	Improve ability to articulate knowledge	Students give oral reports on their term projects.
20. Use of learning resources.	Conduct historical research at the libraries, archives and historical societies.	Students use the University library system in their research, the GC Academic Resource Center for class readings and term project materials, and the Research Center of the Minnesota Historical Society, and county and local historical societies for their historical research.
21. Task completion.	Academic acculturation	A schedule is established for completion of each phase of the term project.
22. Appropriate interaction with peers, faculty, and staff on academic issues.	Academic acculturation	Students make appointments to meet individually or in groups of two or three with the instructor and T.A. to discuss progress on their term project.
23. Understand themselves better as learners.	Academic acculturation	More implicit than explicit.
24. Evaluate their own strengths, limitations, and interests.	Academic acculturation	More implicit than explicit.
25. Set attainable academic and career goals.	Not applicable unless they decide to become history majors and/or are considering teaching or historical research/writing as careers.
26. Time management.	Academic acculturation	A schedule is established for completion of each phase of the term project.
27. Test taking.	Academic acculturation	Tests in the course become progressively complex.
28. Library skills.	Conduct historical research at the libraries, archives and historical societies.	Students use the University library system, the research library of the Minnesota Historical Society, and county and local historical societies for their historical research.
29. Condensing and summarizing.	Academic acculturation	Information for their term projects has to be organized, condensed, and summarized in their papers.
30. Techniques for organizing knowledge.	Academic acculturation	Information for their term projects has to be prioritized and arranged in chronological order for their term paper.
31. Familiarity with different learning strategies.	Academic acculturation	Students are exposed to different types of tests, and also build points through oral and written reports and meetings with the instructor.
32. Awareness of personal learning styles.	Academic acculturation	Implicit rather than explicit as students observe it among other students when they work as teams in conducting their research.
33. Other.