Welcome to the Blog for World Forest History 452

You will be expected to keep a weekly blog on the course readings. Aim for 400 to 500 words per week. Please date each entry. I will create a blog template for each of you at this course website, and then you can alter the blog as you like. The reading schedule and suggested questions for your blog are posted here.

Three times during the course of the semester I will read and comment on these blogs, but you should write each week. I encourage you to comment on each other's blog entries and to use your peers' reflections as stimuli for your own thoughts.

This website [click here] contains starting questions that you may use for your blog entries, but you may also write on any specific topic of your choice. Your entries may contain your own reading notes and ideas about the works we read, questions for future research that arise from your reading, and responses to posted questions and suggestions.

Writing about what you've read has several benefits: it enables you to remember what you've read; it helps you make connections and ask questions of your own; it raises questions you might not otherwise think about; it helps you engage with a community of scholarship; and it improves the quality of class discussion.

Reading journals are a key component of your intellectual development. Most scholars refer back to them often throughout their careers. You'll have a much better chance of enjoying and succeeding with your journal if you get into the habit of working on it regularly. In many ways, your journal entries should be the easiest and most enjoyable part of the course, especially if you avoid falling behind and having to cram all your entries in right before the dates I collect them. Posting these entries as blogs will allow you to turn a private reading journal into a broader conversation.

I will not be grading your journals on grammar, style, or length, or how similar your ideas about the reading are to my own impressions of the reading. Instead, I will be looking for signs of intellectual engagement with the course material.

Prof. Langston