American Motherhood

Student Learning Outcomes, Goals, Objectives:

Students successfully completing this course will be able to:

• Acquire a more informed historical perspective on seminal works and events shaping contemporary ideas about motherhood and the roles of mothers in the family and in society.
• Critique the process by which roles or attributes assigned by society come over time to be seen or valued as ‘natural’ or ‘universal’.
• Evaluate the growing influence of personal writing (memoirs, blogs) on the issues treated in this course and the challenges this trend represents to more traditional ideas about how ‘knowledge’ is produced.
• Learn to evaluate and synthesize information from various sources in order to develop, articulate and defend their own interpretation of events, concepts and social relationships.
• Apply these concepts, critiques and theories in original analyses of texts discussed in the course or identified through their research.

Course Grading Information:

Activity/Performance Measure	Percentage/Points
Discussion Board	35%
Short Response paper	25%
Informal Final Paper/Project proposal	5%
Final paper	35%

Grading Scale

Percentage	Letter Grade
93 to 100%	A
90 to < 93%	A-
87 to < 90%	B+
83 to < 87%	B
80 to < 83%	B-
77 to < 80%	C+
73 to < 77%	C
70 to < 73%	C-
67 to < 70%	D+
63 to < 67%	D
60 to < 63%	D-
0 to < 60%	F

Attendance/Participation:

Regular participation in online discussion is an important, required component of the course. Discussions provide opportunities to:

1. demonstrate your understanding of the reading assignments,

2. expand your understanding of the readings through the process of articulating your ideas and responding to the thoughts and insights of your classmates, and

3. interact with your classmates and professor in a learning community

Each week you will be required to make at least three substantive contributions to the class discussion.

Course Materials Purchased by the Students:

Hum by Helen Phillips