Introduction to Modules

“Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.”  ~John Dewey

The “American Dream”

Because this is a dialog-based course, it is imperative that you come to class on time and actively participate in all classroom activities. It is expected that you will have a variety of perspectives and opinions, and I absolutely encourage independent thinking and lively class discussion. However, our disagreements must not get personal and must always be articulated in a respectful and intellectual manner. You will be responsible for leading class discussion at various points during the semester.

During the course of the semester, as we work to further develop and improve our critical thinking and writing skills, we will examine the world and our place in it. To situate our study for the remainder of the course, we look first to the concept of the “American Dream.” James Truslow Adams, the man who coined the term in 1931, wrote in The Epic of America that the American Dream is

"that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is a difficult dream for the European upper classes to interpret adequately, and too many of us ourselves have grown weary and mistrustful of it. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position" (214-215).

This pre-flight inquiry will be driven by class dialog that will include asking ourselves such questions as: “Do we believe the American Dream exists today or ever?  “Do all Americans have equal opportunities to achieve the American Dream? 

The first order of business, however, will be an in-class exploratory writing exercise where we will answer the question “What does the American Dream mean to me?” We will share our answers in class or in group discussion.

What Comes Next

This course is divided into four modules. Our inquiry into the problems of the first three modules will be enabled by exploratory writing and class/group dialog and through selected readings and videos. You will be asked to further stimulate class dialog by conducting outside interviews, collecting related news stories, or bringing in artifacts to share, such as pictures and music. These assignment choices will be driven by in-class dialog. The final module will be a culmination of points that have been raised during the first three modules. That is to say, it is my hope that we offer some solutions to the problems we are discussing in the first three modules so that by module four, you are able to offer a thoughtful, actionable solution to one of the problems we’ve discussed.

Click here to download assignment sheet.