European and Jewish History

Grade 10 · Full Year Course · Europe and the Middle East, 1400 to today, through the recurring question: is “progress” real?

Course overview

This course covers the history of Europe and the Middle East from the year 1400 to today. The big question of this course is: is “progress” real? Many people believe that human life naturally gets better over time — fairer, freer, more advanced. This class asks you to test that belief rather than just accept it. Some historians argue this belief is fairly recent, and that people in the past usually saw history as moving in circles, not moving forward. Other historians point to real evidence for progress: people today live longer, more people can read and write, and violence between people has dropped over the long run. You will weigh both sides using evidence, the same way a historian would.

For most of human history, daily life changed very slowly — people used many of the same tools and lived in much the same way for thousands of years. This course starts by looking at how societies held onto stability, and then follows the idea of progress as it takes shape. Along the way, you will look at moments that seem to prove progress happened — and moments, like the Holocaust, that seem to disprove it. By the end of the year, you will form and defend your own answer to the question: does history actually move toward something better?

Throughout the year, students will use the theme of progress as a recurring lens: each unit asks them to compare claims of improvement with evidence from political change, social life, technology, violence, rights, and lived experience.

Essential questions

Is “progress” a discovery about how history actually works, an ideology that certain thinkers and states promoted, or both? How would we tell the difference?
Why did the idea of “progress” emerge only recently in human history — and who had a stake in promoting it?
What did revolution, emancipation, and appeals to “progress” actually offer different peoples of Europe and the Middle East — and what did they demand in return?
What evidence did believers in progress point to, and what counter-evidence did events supply?

Historical thinking skills

In addition to content mastery, students will build and be assessed on:

Sourcing — evaluating a document's author, audience, purpose, and moment of creation before using it as evidence
Contextualization — situating a source or event within the broader circumstances of its time and place
Corroboration — comparing multiple sources to identify agreement, conflict, and gaps in the evidence
Historiographical comparison — recognizing how different historians interpret the same events differently, and why those interpretations change over time
Evidence-based argumentation — building and defending a historical claim using primary and secondary sources rather than assertion

Course structure and units

Unit	Weeks / Focus	Topics	Key concepts & questions
1	Week 1 The World Before Progress: Stability-Seeking Societies	Defining “progress” as a historical idea, not a human constant How Medieval Europe and the Islamic world organized for stability: government, law, armed force, religion, social rank, custom Disequilibrium: technology (heavy plough, horseshoe, windmills) and war (Reconquista, Crusades)	Cyclical time vs. progressive time Stability as a value system
2	Weeks 2–3 New Empires, Old Worlds (1200–1500)	The rise of the Italian communes and the myth of the Renaissance The printing press and the transformation of European intellectual culture Navigational improvements The unification of and Inquisition in Spain; the expulsion of Jews and Muslims from Iberia (1492) The Reuchlin Affair	Religious uniformity as a tool of imposed stability How expulsion and conquest reshaped the religious map of the region
3	Weeks 4–5 Reformation, Absolutism, and Religious War (1500–1700)	New World; the Valladolid Debate The Protestant and Catholic Reformations and the fracturing of Christian unity French Wars of Religion The Thirty Years' War and the Peace of Westphalia State building in England, France and Central Europe The Khmelnytsky Uprising and its impact on Poland-Lithuania Shabbatai Zvi	Religious pluralism as a tool of imperial stability (and its limits) Absolutism as an answer to the chaos of religious war What are the main features of sovereignty that Bodin and Grotius develop?
4	Weeks 6–8 The Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment (1600–1789)	The Scientific Revolution and the emergence of “progress” as a concept in European thought The Copernican System and Galileo The Enlightenment: reason, natural rights, and critiques of tradition and religious authority Epistemology: the study of how people know what they claim to know Political economy: the relationship between government, markets, labor, and wealth Political theory Enlightenment debates over the status of religious and ethnic minorities Mendelssohn and Lessing	Why did the idea of progress emerge when it did? How new ideas about reason and rights unsettled old hierarchies How did scientific discoveries challenge religious doctrine?
5	Weeks 9–10 Revolution and Empire (1789–1815)	The French Revolution: liberty, equality, and the redefinition of citizenship The extension (and limits) of rights to religious minorities under revolutionary and Napoleonic rule Napoleon's conquests and the export of revolutionary law across Europe Conservative reaction and the Congress of Vienna (1815)	Citizenship as the political expression of “progress” Rights vs. identity: what changed, and what was demanded in exchange
6	Weeks 11–13 Industrialization, Nationalism, and Reform (1815–1880)	The Industrial Revolution and the transformation of daily life, labor, and cities Liberalism, nationalism, and the unifications of Italy and Germany Haskalah: the Jewish Enlightenment movement that emphasized education, reform, and engagement with European intellectual life Russian Jewry Ottoman reform: the Tanzimat, a 19th-century reform program aimed at modernizing law, administration, and citizenship in a multi-ethnic empire Urbanization and the changing status of religious and ethnic minorities across Europe	Does industrial growth — the “material progress” contemporaries pointed to — translate into social or political equality? Reform from above vs. change from below
7	Weeks 14–15 Imperialism, Race, and the Crisis of Progress (1880–1914)	New Imperialism and the scramble for empire The rise of racial pseudo-science and its use to justify hierarchy and exclusion Nationalist movements within multi-ethnic empires (Balkan nationalism, Zionism, Arab nationalism) The Dreyfus Affair as a window into the politics of a fracturing liberal order	Racial ideology's use of the language of “scientific progress” to justify hierarchy Competing nationalisms as responses to imperial decline
8	Weeks 16–19 War and Revolution: The Unraveling of the Old Order (1914–1939)	World War I and the collapse of the Ottoman, Russian, German, and Austro-Hungarian empires The Russian Revolution and the rise of the Soviet state The postwar settlement, new nation-states, and the British and French Mandates in the Middle East The rise of fascism and Nazism amid interwar economic and political crisis	How quickly did confidence in the progress narrative collapse once put under strain? The interwar period as a test of liberal and imperial orders alike
9	Weeks 20–23 World War II and the Holocaust: A Crisis for the Ideology of Progress	The Nazi state, total war, and occupation across Europe The machinery of the Holocaust: law, bureaucracy, and industrial killing Resistance, collaboration, and rescue across occupied Europe The war in the Pacific and the global scale of the conflict	Mass murder as “organized” rather than chaotic The ideology's central claim under strain: does advance in technique or organization entail advance in morality?
10	Weeks 24–27 Postwar Order: Cold War, Decolonization, and a New Middle East (1945–1970s)	The Cold War and the division of Europe Decolonization across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East The UN Partition Plan and the establishment of the State of Israel (1948) within the broader wave of postwar state-building Postwar reconstruction and the reordering of European and Middle Eastern societies	New statehood as a form of stability after catastrophe and empire Decolonization and self-determination as expressions of “progress”
11	Weeks 28–30 The Contemporary World (1970s–Present)	The end of the Cold War and the reshaping of Europe Conflict, diplomacy, and shifting alliances in the modern Middle East Migration, pluralism, and the changing composition of European and Middle Eastern societies Contemporary debates over nationalism, human rights, and the future of the idea of progress	Has “progress” been achieved, reversed, or redefined? Course synthesis: revisiting the theme of progress across 600 years and across the region's many peoples

Readings & Assignments by Unit

The full reading list and written assignment for each of the eleven units.

Course materials

Primary textbook: to be confirmed by the instructor before the first unit begins
Assigned readings drawn from primary sources (communal records, memoirs, responsa, government decrees, testimony)
Selected historiographic excerpts presenting differing scholarly interpretations of key turning points
Maps and demographic data tracing Jewish population and migration, 1400–present
Short documentary and film excerpts used to supplement written sources
A course reader/coursepack, distributed by unit

Assessment and grading

Component	Weight	Notes
Classwork	20%	In class, students will complete routine worksheets, presentations, and other assignments.
Class participation	20%	Students are expected to be actively engaged in class. To that end, students must come to class fully prepared and ready to discuss the day's topic, and are expected to contribute appropriately by asking questions, collaborating respectfully with classmates, and remaining engaged throughout the lesson.
Class preparedness & professionalism	10%	Based on consistent professional conduct: arriving before the bell, being seated and ready with required materials, limiting unnecessary time out of class, avoiding disruptive behavior, and following the classroom's screen-free policy (phones, laptops, and tablets are prohibited). Three tardies take one point off the final semester grade.
Formal Assessments	50%	An exam at each marking period, plus midterm and final exams, and short unannounced in-class quizzes to assess preparation and ongoing comprehension.
Final Exam / Cumulative Project	20%	Comprehensive assessment revisiting the course's progress theme; administered in the Week 36 review week.
Extra Credit	0%	There is no extra credit.

The course follows the school's standard grading scale; specific letter-grade cutoffs will be provided by the instructor or school handbook.

Classroom expectations

Come prepared to discuss assigned readings; this is a seminar-style course built on discussion, not lecture alone.
Engage with primary sources directly — you are expected to form and defend your own historical judgments.
Treat sensitive and contested material (persecution, genocide, political conflict) with seriousness and respect for differing perspectives.
Late work, absence, and academic integrity policies follow the school's general handbook.
Students with documented learning accommodations should share their plan with the instructor in the first two weeks of the course so materials and assessments can be adapted accordingly.

Communication

It is essential that you check your school email account and Google Classroom at least daily for announcements, assignments, grades, and other vital communications. You are responsible for completing any assignments on time; not checking your email is not a valid excuse.

If you are absent, it is your responsibility to make up the work and catch up on important announcements or schedule changes.