A couple of weeks ago I gave a quick overview of the
National Genealogical Society’s Home Study Course, which I’ve been working on
for the last year or so. As I mentioned
in that post, there are both good and bad points to the course. Lesson 1 is an example.
The lesson itself is pretty straight-forward. The goal is to introduce the field of
genealogy, including standards for recording and communicating information. The assignments are fairly simple. First, fill out and document a pedigree
chart. Second, fill out and document a
family group sheet. Easy right?
It would seem easy, but this lesson, which unfortunately is
an introduction to the course, causes a lot of confusion for many people. The confusion is not so much within the
lesson, or the goals of the lesson, but more in what, exactly, a student should
send in when they submit their completed assignments.
The confusion, I think, lies in this statement in the
instructions for the assignment:
“Be sure to include
the source or sources for every item of information, using correct citation
form as described, with examples, in Evidence
Explained by Elizabeth Shown Mills
or as described in The Chicago
Manual of Style.”[1]
Reading through my
copy of Evidence! Citation & analysis for the Family Historian, also
by Elizabeth Shown Mills, it was clear to me that a source was a
physical thing that I was obtaining evidence from. Books, manuscripts, microfilms, people, etc.,
are sources. A citation was a
recorded note describing what source I had used.
This is where I,
and other students apparently, became confused.
The lesson assignment clearly states “…include the source or sources for
every item of information…” When I
submitted my assignment, I also included cited copies of the documents that I used as
sources. When the lesson was returned,
the grader noted that it was not necessary to send copies of the documents, only
citations of the documents were required.
When the question
of what to include came up on the course mailing list, one subscriber responded
with something along the lines of “just follow the instructions!” My response to that was, “I did.”
It was at this
point that I realized that I, and others, had read the assignment too literally. We included sources, when the assignment had
really meant source citations.
This is one example
of where the course could be improved with a couple of wording changes. If the instructions clearly said citations,
the number of questions to the course’s mailing list would drop, and the number
of people doing more work than necessary would decrease. As I mentioned in the other post, the course’s
mailing list is not archived, so the answer to the question “Should I include
copies of all of my sources when I submit my assignment?” keeps being asked,
and answered, over and over again.
On a positive note,
I did receive good feedback from the grader about my citations, and I passed
the assignment with a single resubmit.
To see more about the NGS Home Study Course, see my other posts:
[1] Lesson 1,
Written Assignments, American Genealogy: Home Study Course, National
Genealogical Society, CD-ROM (Arlington, Virginia: National Genealogical
Society, 2009)
