10/4
Scheuer explains why liberal arts education is necessary and how STEM education is taking over. He explains basically a lot of the core curriculum. The University of New England’s model of a liberal arts education encompasses all aspects of life, which I guess is the point of a liberal arts education. It states that from this type of learning, students will develop critical thinking skills and foundational knowledge that will help them to take their roles in their environments. Core courses are meant to develop or improve students’ abilities and skills in social and cultural literacy. This includes the arts and languages, being able to write effectively, sciences, environmental awareness, environmental literacy, and civic understanding. After taking courses within the core curriculum, students should be prepared for caring for the wellbeing of individuals, our planet, and society. They can demonstrate skills such as application, integration of knowledge, and synthesis. The core themes of a liberal arts education are environmental awareness, social and global awareness, critical thinking: human responses to problems and challenges, citizenship and civic engagement. These themes allow students to explore themes from multiple perspectives and disciplines. The themes let students explore all aspects of study while still studying their discipline. The main objective of a liberal arts education is to prepare students to enter the real world as local, national, and global citizens and professionals. Core curriculum uses integrated learning to make students use self-directed and ongoing learning.
My ENG 110 course fits into the english composition section of the curriculum. According to the handbook, “English Composition introduces students to writing as a conscious and developmental activity… learn to read, think, and write in response to a variety of texts, to integrate their ideas with those of others, and to treat writing as recursive process… students are exposed to a range of reading and writing techniques… and are introduced to fundamental skills of information literacy… work individually and collaboratively, participate in peer review, and learn to take more responsibility for their writing development.” This course fits this description, given I do have the department head as my teacher. The class uses a daily class discussion, reading and annotating articles, along with using peer review.
My PSY 105 course fits into the explorations section of the curriculum. According to the handbook, “”Explorations courses introduce a humanities or social science discipline as a way of knowing. By exploring a topic, issue, or theme within the framework of a particular discipline… provide an introduction to the assumptions, methods, and terminology of that discipline.” Since I am not a psychology major, PSY 105 fits into my credits as an exploratory course. It is considered a social science exploration course.
My ASL 101 class doesn’t seem to fit into the core curriculum. No where in the handbook does it talk about the importance of taking or learning other languages. It also does not include topics such as learning about disabilities or impairments or the hardships in life.
10/7
- Out of my three courses I chose to look into for this activity, I think all three can fit into Scheuer’s description of ensuring critical thinking and citizenship. One of the main goals in the ENG 110 course is to better critical thinking and integrate ideas, new and old, into everyday life. With that being said, this course clearly fits Scheuer’s description. In class we work in pairs of groups and have class discussions. We also have projects and lengthy homework assignments that allow us to think in different ways. PSY 105 also can fit Scheuer’s description of ensuring critical thinking and citizenship. This class works mainly by teaching oneself, which makes us use different types of thinking as well as collaborating with my peers. Lastly, my ASL 101 class allows me to use a different way of thinking as I am learning a new language with a deaf teacher. The rest of my class also does not know the language and we have been able to work together to succeed thus far. We collaborate to communicate and learn through this class.
- Revised paragraph below from October 4ths assignment.
Scheuer explains why liberal arts education is necessary and how STEM education is taking over. He explains basically a lot of the core curriculum described in the CAS Handbook. The University of New England’s model of a liberal arts education encompasses all aspects of life, which I guess is the point of a liberal arts education. It states that from this type of learning, students will develop critical thinking skills and foundational knowledge that will help them to take their roles in their environments. Core courses are meant to develop or improve students’ abilities and skills in social and cultural literacy. This includes the arts and languages, being able to write effectively, sciences, environmental awareness, environmental literacy, and civic understanding. Scheuer talks about how this concept of a liberal arts education has worked for nearly two thousand years and should continue to be used. He also states that “liberal arts [are] also a complicated and antiquated term, yolking together two words that don’t obviously belong in harness and may not be ideally suited for hauling their intellectual load into the twenty-first century.” This quote subtly goes against the aspect of pro liberal arts, but gives some of the hesitance by some people. Many people think that “liberal” arts brings politics into it, but it is just a different way of learning.
After taking courses within the core curriculum, students should be prepared for caring for the wellbeing of individuals, our planet, and society. Students should be able to demonstrate skills such as application, integration of knowledge, and synthesis. The core themes of a liberal arts education according to the CAS Handbook are environmental awareness, social and global awareness, critical thinking: human responses to problems and challenges, citizenship and civic engagement. According to Scheuer, the core themes of a liberal arts education are grammar, rhetoric, logic, medieval quadrivium of arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy, and arts. Although they seem to be a little different, these themes all allow students to explore themes from multiple perspectives and disciplines. The themes let students explore all aspects of study while still studying their discipline. The main objective of a liberal arts education is to prepare students to enter the real world as local, national, and global citizens and professionals. Core curriculum uses integrated learning to make students use self-directed and ongoing learning.
