Tests on outside reading
Tests on outside reading are always difficult, but they must be employed if the reading is not to become a farce. By having weekly reading reports on uniform cards, one can often arrange groups of students who have read the same thing and can therefore be tested by a single question. By extending this over several weeks the majority of students, even in a large class, can be tested with relatively few questions. Some instructors require students to hand in their reading notes, others check up the books the students use in the library, still others have consultation periods in which they inquire into the student's reading. Quiz sections, if there are any, offer a good opportunity to test collateral reading.
Miscellaneous aids in teaching history
Map making, coördinated with the recitations and so designed as to require more than mere tracing, is desirable in introductory courses. The imaginative historical theme written by the student is employed—and successfully, it is declared—in one college. A syllabus is highly useful in the hands of students in lecture courses. It can be mimeographed at comparatively slight expense for each lecture, thus permitting changes in successive years—a distinct advantage over the printed syllabus.
The problem of suitable examination
How to give a fair and telling examination is the college teacher's perennial problem. The less he teaches and insists on facts and details, the greater his quandary. A majority of students incline to parrot what they have heard, to the dismay of the teacher who wants them to make the subject their own. Hence tests calling the memory only into play do not satisfy the true teacher or the thoughtful student. At the least there should be some questions requiring constructive or synthetic thinking by the student. Above all, the instructor of introductory work should form a first-hand personal opinion of the student by requiring him to come to the office for consultation. Nothing can take the place of the personal touch. Quiz masters are better than no touch; but they are a poor substitute for the small class and direct contact, even if the instructor is not one of the masters of the profession.
The worth of topical or institutional treatment
The topical or institutional treatment of history has been mentioned above as being particularly applicable to modern history. If carefully worked out beforehand it can be made to embrace virtually everything—certainly everything significant—that is contained either in the text or in a chronological narrative. To be sure, a topical treatment of this kind places more emphasis on the common experiences of mankind than does national history, and, as some nations or peoples precede others in a given development, history becomes continuous instead of fragmentary. Perhaps, too, the way certain matters are introduced into "continuous" history may appear forced, unless it be remembered that this impression is created merely by its dissimilarity from the usual interpretation, which is just as arbitrary and forced until one gets accustomed to it.
Classification in topical treatment
It will be serviceable in arranging a topical treatment of any period of history, which shall show a sense of historical continuity and keep in mind the fundamental stimuli and causes of human action, to note that virtually all human interests can be classified under one of the following six heads: physical, economic, social, religious, political, and intellectual (or cultural). Though these are never wholly isolated and are always interactive, one or the other may be specially significant in a given era, and thus we speak of a religious age, an age of rationalism, or the period of the industrial revolution.