THE_TEACHING_COMPANY_USER_COMMUNITY Forum Index
RegisterSearchFAQMemberlistUsergroupsfChatLog in
Reply to topic Page 1 of 1
War and World History course
Author Message
Reply with quote
Post War and World History course 
I don't know how many of you have ordered this course, but maybe I can save you some trouble and expense by not recommending it. I am just finishing the 48 lecture series, a chore in itself, and it is probably the most poorly organized and poorly taught course in my considerable collection.
If you check the regular teach12 site for reviews, you will see that most other early reviewers share my sentiments. Though I haven't submitted a review there, I intend to soon.
I am surprised it wasn't screened better before release. Maybe the video version is tolerable, but the audio is not.
Okay, moving from the general to the specific, here are the criticisms.

Style of delivery - exasperating. Professor Roth raises pitch of voice for last syllables of sentences and it creates annoying sing-song speech pattern. Many words are over- and unnecessarily emphasized, some one syllable words are elongated into three syllables, and it seriously detracts from concentrating on the content of the lecture.
That would still be tolerable, but the greatest liability is the many, and I mean many - as in hundreds of sentences that are fractured by frequent "uhs" and stumbles. as if he is lost and unsure of where he is in the lecture and what he is going to say next. He also begins hundreds of sentences with " now", which I consider unacceptable for a professional lecture style. Worse, on occasion, he commits the unpardonable lecture sin of using " you know."
Some lectures are a straight recitation of facts and trivia with no guiding principle or coherent theme. Actually, they are a meaningless ramble. There just seems to be no organizational center. Early on, I attempted to take notes and finally abandoned that effort.
Finally, there are lecture segments of substantial length that have no corresponding reference or citations in the outline, and I find this particularly troublesome because the sources or people treated in the lecture were often obscure, or certainly not mainstream enough where they could be tracked easily.

I think the concept for a course of this nature is a good idea, but this was so poorly prepared and poorly organized, it proved to be a major disappointment. I think in the hands of Dr. Liulevicius, this would be a dynamite course, but not for this professor on this trip through.

View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:
Reply to topic Page 1 of 1
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum