This was a really fun class and teaches you a lot about ancient Israel. Smoak is really engaging and passionate about the material. He's super approachable and easy to talk to. He gives great feedback and advice on the papers. There were two exams and one essay for this class with a one page FRQ for most of the classes. I really liked taking professor Smoak and would recommend people interested to take this class.

I took AN N EA 12W with Professor Smoak which is basically the same thing as 10W (only with less students in a class). Smoak is very helpful and nice (btw he studied at Jerusalem). The course material is very interesting!! It helps if you have a bit of previous knowledge of religion but even if you don't, you would still do good in this class. Essays are a bit heavy but in general, an awesome class!
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IM SELLING PDF VERSION OF "JERUSALEM ONE CITY THREE FAITHS" by Karen Armstrong. Shoot me a quick email if you're interested:
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Doesn't record or post lecture materials. Lectures tend to be quite long-winded and hard to understand. I would say about 15% of the material actually shows up on the test. Honestly, this class depends a lot on how hard your TA grades. In addition, the weight for each category can be a little wonky, for ex getting a 100% on your final raises your grade 1% while a point on a participation grade will raise it by 3%.

This class was really interesting and the lectures were pretty interesting to follow along. The professor was clearly knowledgable on the subject and obviously wanted his students to understand the material. The group project at the end of the year was pretty interactive and refreshing to do. Definitely would recommend this GE to anyone who is even remotely curious about the origins of writing. I am also selling the course material ("The Story of Writing") for $10. Email me at ************* if interested.

Somewhat more work than other G.E.'s, but definitely doable. Procrastinated pretty heavy in this class, which reflected in my final grade. Quizzes are free points, just read a day before and make sure to connect the ideas in the reading with points of emphasis during lecture, as he tends to put info like that on the quizzes. Midterm and final were fair as they each focused on the writing systems learned in the previous weeks. Group project was fun, although we got snubbed of extra credit tbh. Overall, class was ok and definitely loses steam towards the end of the quarter as lectures just drag in which you repeat random ancient alphabets.

SELLING THE ROBINSON TEXTBOOK- "The Story of Writing, 2nd Edition" for $10, basically new with no highlighting or writing inside. email me @ ************* to purchase!

Professor Smoak is a genuinely cool, down-to-earth man who is really fascinated by the material in his lectures. I thought that the class was more than fair and actually interested me. Often times, we had guest lecturers who were his teaching assistants. They always had interesting and valuable information to share about their areas of study. I would recommend this class. It is pretty darn easy if you stay on top of your work.

I am selling "The Study of Writing" of any one is interested.

Contact: S*************