History Learning Outcomes

• Historical Thinking (as an expression of critical thinking):

  Students will be able to demonstrate historical thinking by:

  • Identifying historical societies with a sensitivity to their unique geographic, chronological, cultural, social, and technological settings
  • Analyzing historical artifacts, including texts and objects created by post societies, as evidence for the historical experience of those societies
  • Assessing multiple types of historical causation, such as geography and ecology, cultural precedent and belief, and unique events and circumstances
  • Formulating well-reasoned historical arguments or conclusions

• Historical Communication (as an expression of communication skills):

  Students will be able to demonstrate historical writing by:

  • Recognizing and utilizing language and format appropriate for a specific intended audience
  • Synthesizing ideas, perspectives, and primary and secondary sources to formulate original analytical arguments
  • Employing appropriate conventions to produce discipline-appropriate written work
  • Presenting the results of original research in a compelling and convincing manner.

• Historical Literacy (as an expression of historiography, information literacy, research methods and quantitative literacy):

  Students will be able to demonstrate historical literacy by:

  • Articulating the difference between historical fact and historical interpretation based on primary sources
  • Identifying relevant secondary sources on a subject and how secondary sources create historiography
  • Employing appropriate evidence in constructing a historical argument; and
  • Using quantitative methods, when appropriate, to articulate a historical argument

• Historical Ethical Reasoning (as an expression of ethical reasoning):

  Students will be able to demonstrate historical ethical reasoning by:

  • Identifying ethically significant issues as the consequences of historical processes
  • Analyzing the ethical positions of past and present societies, including societies other than their own
  • Considering the cultural and professional obligations of historical research and writing
  • Reflecting on the impact of historical events and decisions on their own ethical positions