Course Title:  World History
 
2 Semesters – 10 Credits – 5 Class periods per week
 

Course Objectives:
A comprehensive study of the World’s history is a rather daunting endeavor, but it must have its grounding foremost in a core of Biblical understanding.  This Biblical core begins first with a discussion of God’s sovereignty.  God is the Master Designer of the affairs of this world.  His sovereignty is evident as societies rise and fall.  Throughout history, He has spoken His desire for the World to know His Truth and to come to knowledge of Him as Savior.  Man is his depravity has permitted sin to enter into God’s plans and caused man to act in ways contrary to God’s design.  God, however, still shows His faithfulness to this fallen World through the redemptive work of His Son and the continuing work of those who follow in Jesus’ footsteps.  The history of this World is replete with examples of those who follow Jesus and those who chose not to, and the results of both of these actions.
 
In the process of this course, students will be required to learn to and take lecture notes.  They will engage in class discussions concerning information presented in lecture and in readings.  The will also be required to look at current world events and discover how they relate to what they have been studying.  Several projects will also be required helping the students to dig deeper into the content of key chapters.  A coordinated effort between their English class and World History will require reading a book and writing a paper in response.  Homework will be assigned on a regular basis.  Tests (chapter, unit and finals) will assess student’s knowledge of materials presented.
 
Course Description:
World History begins with a discussion of the beginning.  A truthful look at how God created the world and all that is in it.  With this discussion, students will also look at the fall of man and how all the events of history fall in line from that event.  From this point, students will look at the beginnings of civilization starting with the earliest in the Indus River Valley and along the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers.  Students will learn the key components for the development of civilization and using the aforementioned examples discover how those civilizations exemplified those components.  As civilizations began to spread across the world, empires began to arise.  Students will explore the Greek and Roman empires and discuss the vast contributions both of those empires made to the modern world.  With this foundation laid, the development of civilizations and empires in Africa, Latin America and China will also be investigated.  With the addition of these new cultures, a discussion of world religions is necessary.  Students will learn of the various world religions; their belief systems and their impact in the world.  After the fall of the Roman Empire, students will learn of man’s attempts to re-establish some sort of order in the Era of Feudalism.  Often known as the Dark Ages, discussions of man’s attempt to control another will demonstrate a need for God and a True relationship with Jesus Christ rather than the forced attempts by the Holy Roman Catholic Church and the injustices they perpetrated.  Students will also discover those working to truly establish solid relationships with Christ and the price they often paid as martyrs.  They will also investigate the Crusades and the scars created when religion picks up a banner and tries to institute Christianity without the love of Christ.  Emerging from the Dark Ages brings the students to a study of the Renaissance, the rebirth of thought.  It is during this era that people were actually encouraged to think things through for themselves.  In this time of “freedom of thought”, though not complete freedom, men like Martin Luther will question the teachings of the Church and turn the religious world upside-down in the Reformation.  Of course, not all changes would bring a spread of Christian thought.  Other thoughts would come to play, such as Islam.  Students will examine the spread of Islam and its impact on the world even to today.  The Ottoman Empire, arguably one of the most important of the Islamic empires, will spread over the Middle East, into Africa and Europe spreading the culture and religion of Islam.   Europe will also taste a desire to move out from the boundaries it knew and to explore the rest of the world.  In the Age of Exploration, European explorers will move out into Africa, Asia and eventually the Americas and open up new spaces for settlement and the spread of the Gospel.  On the heels of the explorations comes a new desire for knowledge.  Students will move into a discussion of the Enlightenment and Absolutism.  During the Enlightenment, people were encouraged to reason for themselves and find truth from within.  In Absolutism, students will examine what selfish ambition did to the hearts and minds of the people.  This absolutism would eventually plant the seeds for a God-less culture framed by the dictates of Evolution.  With this foundation laid, students will then analyze the role of Enlightenment thinking on the revolutions in both the British colonies and France.  Once the fires of revolution were extinguished, Europe thrust herself into the Age of Industrialism.  Examination of the Industrial Revolution, first in Europe and spreading to the United States, will allow the student to explore the revolutionary impact the age of machines had on business and labor, clearly demonstrating that once industrialism set in, life would never be the same.  Of course, man’s greed would come into play because of the great ability for success and excess.  Students will examine the relationship between industrialism and imperialism where countries were seeking to spread their influence in order to establish their position in the business markets of the world.  With the attainment of such wealth and desire for acquisition, the world would find itself thrust into a series of wars.  Truly Jesus’ words of “war upon war and rumors of war” were seen played out on the world stage.  Both World War I and II demonstrated man’s depravity in his quest for more.  Students will discuss the depth that man’s depravity would push them even to the development of weapons of mass destruction (mustard gas and the Atomic bomb) and further to the annihilation of almost an entire race of people (the Jews in the Holocaust).  In between these two wars, students will examine the economic failure of the Great Depression as both a worldwide event and a catalyst to Hitler’s rise to power.  Once the destructive power of the atomic bomb had been realized, the world was thrust into a new type of war, Cold War.  As the students finish the year, they will study the impact of nuclear technology on world governments, economies and the quest for power and domination.  They will discover both the heights and depths that world powers were willing to go in order to obtain more and more power.
 
Textbook:
 
Patterns for Interactions.  Beck, Black, Krieger, et al.  McDougall-Littell: 2003
 
Prerequisites:
 
High school standing.