Catinas:
Bay of Pigs/Vietnam
Bay of Pigs/Vietnam
Violence/Christianity
Religion/New Monarchs
Periodization/Dark Ages
Chaos/Great Art
Modernization/History
Women/Renaissance Culture
Good/Evil
Love/Fear/Hatred
Thursday, September 29, 2016
Thursday, September 22, 2016
Harkness Participation
We use a modified version for the Harkness Method to allow diverse learners the opportunity to prepare for and process the discussion questions before class. Accordingly, students are strongly encouraged to check the blog for the guiding question associated with the day's discussion. At-home note-taking should be titled with the topic of the guiding question and relevant textual quotes noting the page number and column or paragraph (56, left or 56, 3rd) included.
Students are encouraged to self-assess their daily verbal class participation during Harkness discussions using the guide below. The characteristics of high-quality Harkness participation include:
Students are encouraged to self-assess their daily verbal class participation during Harkness discussions using the guide below. The characteristics of high-quality Harkness participation include:
A. Use of textual evidence aimed at the question
B. Listen to each other
C. Ask each other questions
D. Participatory, non-dominating, and non-interrupting
E. Link thoughts together to build clear themes, even when different interpretations emerge
SELF-ASSESSMENT
My level of participation during the 4 classes held this week should be rated as:
A. Participates daily
B. Participates regularly
C. Participates sporadically
D. Participates rarely, if ever, but does not distract from discussions
F. Participates rarely, if ever, and also distracts others from discussions
Special note: Deductions will be taken for dominating, interrupting, uncivil, or distracting participation or off-task behavior such as Internet surfing, texting, or outside work.
What should I do if my participation grade is low?
10 Strategies for Increasing Participation
1. When you read, take out some paper, write the assigned blog question(s) at the very top of the page. As you read, when you come across the topics addressed in the question (such as "new monarchs" or "artists" or "history" or "humanism," write down a textual quote or two noting the page number and column or paragraph (56, left or 56, 3rd).
2. Chat with another student in the class about what might be discussed (or a friend or a family member) to brainstorm how you could participate. Make a secret plan with another student to bring each other into the conversation.
3. Send me an email before class with a picture of your bullet point notes responding to the question. (Please only do this IF you are receiving marks of "rarely, if ever, participates"). Partial credit will be considered, depending on quality.
4. Begin a free trial to Study.com for AP European History. They have short 8 minute video tutorials that may serve as a useful pre-reading device, allowing you to get more out of the actual reading. If it helps, let us know. Perhaps we can request a school subscription.
5. Respond to the comments made by others. Say a student makes a general comment, such as Henry VIII broke off from the Catholic Church, find the reading section where that was discussed and raise the specific evidence.
6. Challenge the reading by examining the text for issues of kaleidoscope or periodization or bias. Or, ask a very general question about the reading. It seems to focus on the elites, but how would this have affected the poor, the peasants, women, etc?
7. Pretend to be someone else or someplace else. In other words, engage in some theatricality or sports-like conduct with the Harkness. This tends to reduce nervousness.
8. Take notes during discussion and summarize a few important points that were made during the discussion. Ask to begin the warm-up summary of the last class.
9. Ask specifically to begin the next class's discussion. (Please only do this IF you are receiving marks of "rarely, if ever, participates").
10. Look up in an online dictionary words you don't know. It could be no one really knows what they mean (such as anachronistic, catholic, provincial). You could make mention of this when someone raises the same text. This happens a lot when reading primary sources such as Pico or Machiavelli, for example.
Monday, September 19, 2016
Guidelines for Writing Experiment #1 (Due October 17)
Workshop of Domenico Ghirlandaio, Notary Making an Inventory of a Household,
late fifteenth century. Fresco.
“These [inventories] were drawn up by notaries and listed virtually all the objects (no matter how modest) in a house–in most cases room by room. The notary often distinguished between new and old objects, and ‘old’ was further divided between antico, which mean venerable, vecchio, which meant well worn, and triste which meant worn out. Such documentation offers reliable evidence of a material culture that was truly sumptuous at the high end and dismal indeed at the lowest.”
–Patricia Fortini Brown, Private Lives in Renaissance Venice: Art, Architecture, and the Family
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 65).
GUIDELINES FOR WRITING EXPERIMENT #1
About this type of assignment:
In the fall and spring, students will receive a prompt for a short writing experiment (500 words or less). The purpose of these two writing experiments is to practice “translating” objects into words, one of the fundamental tasks of art historical writing. No research is necessary for these assignments. Instead, students should rely upon their experience with the objects and pay close attention to their personal observations. Each student will determine the form the writing takes: a description, a poem, a review, a narration, a museum object label—any of these forms are welcome. The experiments are intended to be fun exercises in writing about the visual and material world.
Specific instructions for the first writing experiment:
This writing experiment takes its inspiration from the Renaissance-era inventories of Italian homes, which we discussed during the first Renaissance lecture (slides available here). The subject of this piece of experimental writing will be the oldest object in your home. You may want to ask a family member to help you identify what object is the (chronologically) oldest item. A photograph of a loved one, a painting, a teacup, or a piece of furniture are just a few possibilities. The object may be worn out or pristine, miniature or gigantic. Perhaps it is a family heirloom or something your family collected in recent years. If you live in a home dedicated to a contemporary style, the object may be younger than you. The piece of writing you produce can take any form as long as the object is—to the best of your knowledge—the oldest thing in your home.
Photographs and illustrations of the object are welcome.
Due Monday, October 17.
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