A Serendipitous Inspiration of Undergraduate Research

[Note: this is also posted on the BGSU History blog] When I replied “No” to Kinzey’s question, and to Colin’s follow-up, I was pretty sure of my answer. I was wrong. The resulting historical adventure began with a lively class discussion, continued through an independent study, and eventually resulted in an article that undergraduates Kinzey […]

Now available: Instructor’s Guide to Fighting over the Founders

For anyone who might be thinking about teaching Fighting over the Founders, NYU Press has now made available a wonderful instructor’s guide, downloadable from the Press’s website, or if you want a sneak peak, below the fold here. A big shout-out to friend, scholar, and politico John Craig Hammond for putting it together. And, yes, the paperback […]

Emotional learning with Reacting to the Past

Last semester I ran an entire class organized around three Reacting to the Past (RTP) games.  For those of who unfamiliar with RTP, it’s a curriculum that introduces students to major ideas and texts through a highly detailed, intense role-playing format to replicate the historical contexts in which these ideas acquired significance. These games are interdisciplinary, […]

Designing a Digital Humanities course

This is the first time I’ve designed a DH course (though far from the first course I’ve designed, of course).   It wasn’t an easy process, and the product is necessarily idiosyncratic, but, writing the afternoon before the class’s first meeting, I’m pretty excited. I started by thinking about what I wanted students to come away […]