Guidelines for the Final Inventory

Final Inventory: Summer Genesis as Literature

Print out hardcopy of just your own postings. Include as well your postings from the first half of the term.

Focus on the second half of the term, since the Midterm Inventory, but take the first half of the term into account.

Respond to the questions below. Double-space. Attach the inventory to the front, and staple it all together.

Nonlinear, free flowing option: address the questions below in anyway and in any form you want. Essentially: tell me what you did, what you got, and where you are, in some form or another.

Linear option: answer the questions below in order.


Self-Assessment:

• For the blog: Using the grading criteria on the handout on the Genesis Blog from the beginning of the term, write a paragraph or two in some way assessing your work on the blog and giving yourself a grade for the blog. Be sure to be clear about the number of entries.
o Note: think of the Final Inventory as a way of possibly raising the grade on the blog itself. You all have a B if you meet the minimum requirements. If you want an “A,” the inventory is a way of boosting the B. If you haven’t met the minimum requirements for the blog itself, the inventory can boost the grade back up to a B.

• For the class: now, taking attendance and punctuality into account (again, go back to the syllabus), give yourself a grade for the whole course. That’s the average grade of the midterm and final blog assignment, minus any missed classes above two.
o Note: the quality of the blog assignments and of the inventory can make up for these missed classes, at least a little. And if you have good reasons for missing more than two classes without telling me, now is the time (though not the ideal time) to explain that to me.


Postings of the Group:

• In a paragraph or two, describe the postings of the whole group in general terms, their general movement or direction and the themes that have emerged. For example, do you all bounce back and forth between different questions and ideas; do you stick to the same theme; to you focus in on something and then veer off; is their progress? Think metaphorically. If this were a journey, are you going up and down, steadily up, wandering around, getting somewhere? If this is a landscape, what is it? Forest? Desert? Valley? Etc. Do you tend to be interested more in theological questions than literary ones, political issues than literary ones? Are you unsure about literary ones? When it comes to the literary, are you all more interested in issues of character, for example, than plot or theme? Etc. Just be descriptive here.
• Quote part of what you think is the most interesting posting from another student in the class and write a one paragraph response: what’s interesting here? What does this make you think of?

Your Postings

• In a paragraph or two, describe your own postings in general terms: their general movement or pattern or flow; their emerging or dominant themes; the nature of your own thinking. See above.
• What have changed your mind about? Or: What has surprised you? What have you learned? What wasn’t clear that is? What was clear that isn’t? Write a couple of paragraphs.
Some other things you might think about here:
• Explain what’s most clear to you at this point and what isn’t.
• Consult the list of questions I handed out at the beginning of the term, the 5 versus the 5, and reflect on whether you’ve gotten better at staying on track with the “Bible as Literature” kinds of questions versus the others, or have developed some skill in recognizing the difference between these kinds of questions and other theological or political kinds of questions. Given the overlap.
• Talk about the most important thing you’ve learned so far.
• Talk about the remaining question or questions you have, in light of the course.


• Finally, in a paragraph or two: why might any of this matter? In personal terms? Social and cultural terms?