History Lab in the World History Survey: Best Practices

Kean University’s History Gateways Initiative entails the redesign of a World History course that is a required component of the General Education curriculum. The course, therefore, is a required course for every student at Kean, regardless of major. The challenges, therefore, include not just introducing students to the methods and skills of historical thinking and research, but at an even more basic level, helping students understand the relevance of the past to the making of their “presents” and “futures.” Our contribution to the panel will be, therefore, to share how we are applying the "History Lab" concept to the World History Survey through the development of primary source exercises, the building of student skills through primary source analysis, and the growth of historical engagement within our student population. More specifically, we will highlight “lab” techniques deployed in general education (or introductory) courses that build student confidence in “thinking historically” and “thinking critically.” We will also highlight curriculum innovation we are leading at Kean intended to help students “think globally.” Starting from the belief that if “you look local will find global,” we are developing primary source teaching units built around our own local archival resources. These units foster student connection with history by laying bare the global historical factors that have shaped the historical trajectories of their institution, their local communities, and their own lives. Through these creative lab experiments and techniques, students come to understand on both personal and intellectual levels the importance of thinking “world historically” to the understanding of their worlds.