Last week I conducted a workshop for Honors students called “Notetaking for the 21st Century” (if you’re interested, my “online handout” and Prezi are posted on my site). I began by reflecting on what research was like when I began…

We’re in the middle unit of the methods course, where each week is a different sandbox to play in. I have to admit, that sounds all well and good, but I can tell that my students are feeling a little…

This post is about serendipity. In the historical methods class, we’ve been using Williams, Historian’s Toolbox as our guide to methodology, and in his chapter on Sources, he discusses non-documentary historical evidence, including artifacts, archaeology, and genetic/forensic evidence. His case…

Our readings for this week in the Methods Course (History 411) nudged students to think about their own process of research and writing, with three complementary “how to” readings on writing history papers: a chapter from Robert C. Williams, The…

With apologies to Paul Simon for stealing his song title… I’m cross-posting from the Historian’s Craft website a post about our class discussion last week (Thurs 2/3) about the historical conundrum that John Brown poses – or any complex real…

This semester, I’m piloting a methods class in our department. Well, really, I’m kind of co-piloting it; after lots of departmental conversation and some rough planning last year, a colleague of mine wrote the first version of the syllabus and…

There’s chatter today among some of my digital humanities folks about creating swizzly digital CVs: see for example one of the gurus of Digital Campus, Found History‘s Tom Scheinfeldt’s post from last May, “New Wine in Old Skins: Why the…