Evaluations at the end of the Fall Semester were generally favorable. Students seemed to respond well to the relatively small recitation sections. Short written assignments and oral presentations within the recitation sections apparently translate into improved reasoning and writing on essay examinations and longer written work. The Spring Semester results have not been evaluated as faculty are not available during the summer months. With recitation sections now available for all foundation courses, student skills in oral presentation can be more readily evaluated.
Recitations allow more opportunity for students in large classes to develop oral skills.
The emphasis in recitations is oral discussion, although more use is made of short written exercises than previously possible. Student discussions and oral presentations have always been major components of advanced courses and continue to be so. In history, problem solving consists primarily in accumulating and evaluating evidence. Synthesis consists of drawing generalizations or conclusions as a result of the evaluation of evidence. In all courses, students are exposed to the variety of evidence that historians use to reconstruct the past.