Assessment

The assessment for this second-year 15 CATS option module consists of:

• 1 x 3000-word essay (50%)
• 1 x Student Devised Applied Task (presenting a source) (40%)
• Seminar contribution (across the module as a whole) (10%)

For all deadlines, please consult Tabula. General information about deadlines, marking criteria, and presentation and referencing is provided under the 'Assessment' rubric of the virtual undergraduate handbook Link opens in a neLink opens in a new windowon the departmental website.

3000-word essay (50%)

Please contact the seminar tutor to negotiate a title. You are welcome to devise your own title or to adapt one of the seminar questions for this purpose (though please approve the proposed essay question with the seminar tutor first). You will find relevant 'further readings' on the seminar page for each topic, but you are also encouraged to look for additional sources in the library.

Student Devised Applied Task (source presentation) (40%)

This component of the module assessment is based around a primary source analysis. You are welcome to use any text, image or source in another medium studied in the module or examined in the seminars. The key to this assessment is how you present it:

• The source analysis should take a non-academic form (a podcast? a poster? a website design?)
• It should also address an audience outside of academic history (engagement with the general public? a stakeholder group?)

Feel free to discuss ideas for this with the module tutor. Your 'project' should think about how you can use your chosen medium to best present the source and what aspects of it would matter most to your chosen audience.

You can find more guidance and marking criteria for this assessment here.

Seminar contribution (10%)

What is being assessed:

• Oral Communication: clarity of expression; persuasiveness; respectfulness and inclusivity; asking useful/probing questions; contributions that extend the discussion.
• Knowledge and Understanding: evidence of preparation of core and/or wider reading; demonstrates comprehension of the readings and/or seminar questions
• Methodological Approaches: ability to discern, explain, or engage with historiographical or methodological issues raised by the readings and/or seminar questions
• Analysis: engagement with and evaluation of readings; focus on meaning rather than description; evidence and argument-driven responses to seminar questions

This assessment component applies generally to discussion across the regular seminars.

Departmentally-agreed and standardised marking criteria for this component can be found in the student handbook here.

Contact Hours

Student contact hours for this second-year 15 CATS option module are as follows:

• Module duration: Ten weeks
• Seminars: Nine two-hour seminars
• Tutorials: Two hours of feedback and essay preparation
• Total: Twenty hours

Note that the two-hour seminar will include a short break!

Most of the seminars will take place in a normal teaching room, though some sessions may involve 'field trips' to the Library or Modern Records Centre to allow us to handle original material. Since many of the primary source collections that we will be using (e.g. Mass-Observation) are digitised, the use of laptops/iPads and other devices in the seminars is warmly encouraged!