History 12

This course studies the major ideological trends of modern Western Civilization and their effects on the world.  In this course students will be asked to examine the work of a number of thinkers—philosophers, scientists and theologians — in conjunction with their study of historical events and documents.  In essence this is both a course in history and in political philosophy.  It will be most fruitful to seriously consider the power of an idea to shape history.

Students taking this course for Kolbe Core (K) credit will have four papers, a mid-term, and final exam each semester.  Additionally, core students should expect to have daily reading and minor weekly written assignments or quizzes.

Assignment due-dates and grades are established by the parent.  Optionally, a student may be enrolled in the Self-Paced Plus© grading assistance program to receive grading assistance from a Kolbe Academy faculty or staff member on designated assignments in the course.  In this case, parents will still submit final grades to Kolbe for the course, but may choose to incorporate the graded assignments into the student’s overall grade or use the Kolbe-graded assignments to assist in arriving at the student’s final grade.

• Modern History Reader, Kolbe Academy Publishing – Digital copy provided with self-paced course.  Optional physical copy is available for purchase in the Kolbe Bookstore.
• A Documentary History of the United States, Richard D. Heffner
• The Federalist Papers, Hamilton, Madison, Jay
• Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville, abridged edition
• Modern Times: The World from the 20’s to the 90’s, Paul Johnson
• MLA Handbook Eighth Edition

Self-Paced Plus courses include the following:

• Grading by a highly qualified teacher for selected assignments (listed below) in the course.
• Access to teacher through the course’s discussion board.
• Option to report grade given by the teacher, or to report a grade assigned by parent.
• The pacing is still established by the parent in conjunction with the student’s goals and academic calendar. 
• Assignments will be graded within 1-2 weeks of the submission date, excluding holiday breaks.  (For the quickest grading, students should turn assignments in incrementally throughout the year.  If a student turns in multiple assignments to be graded at once, expect a response time of 1-2 weeks per assignment submitted.)

Self-Paced Plus Assignment List:

*We developed a rubric to assist in grading the paper assignments.  Each paper assignment will have the rubric available for the student in the course.